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Get your taxes done using TurboTax
You would only need to report a recapture of depreciation if you sold the vehicle at a later date (after you converted it back to personal use) at a gain. Not gonna happen.
If you claimed any vehicle expenses, be it actual or per-mile (most do per-mile) then a portion of the allowed deduction was for depreciation you were allowed to take on that vehicle. What the program is telling you, is that when you do dispose of that vehicle, be it via trade-in or you sell it outright, then you have to recapture that deprecation and report it as taxable income.
The reason I don't worry about that, is because changes are so slim that you'll sell or trade in that car at a profit, it's not worth bothering with. Here's a rough (very rough) example.
You buy the car brand new in 2010 for $30,000 and immediately put it "in service" for your business. Heck, lets say you only use that car for business and nothing else. That makes it 100% business use. Now the depreciation amount of a vehicle on which you claim the per-mile deduction, depends on the tax year and the miles driven in that year. For example, in 2011 you could deduct 51 cents per mile. Of that, 22 cents per-mile was depreciation. In 2012 you could deduct 55.5 cents per mile, and of that 23 cents per mile was depreciation.
So lets use an average of 21 cents a mile over 5 years just for this scenario. Now a business vehicle traditionally puts one heck of a lot of miles on it. Easily more than 20K miles a year without even trying. So over 5 years you've to 100K miles on it. That's $21K of depreciation on a vehicle you paid $30K for. You'll probably be lucky to get $5K when you sell that car with 100K miles on it after 5 years. Even with recaptured depreciation your cost basis on the vehicle is $9K so you're still selling at a $4K loss. You've got no taxable gain on your sale of the vehicle. So why bother reporting it since you can't claim losses on the sale of personal property anyway?
Now my numbers, are "pulled out of thin air" just for the purposes of this scenario to show you the point here.
If you claimed any vehicle expenses, be it actual or per-mile (most do per-mile) then a portion of the allowed deduction was for depreciation you were allowed to take on that vehicle. What the program is telling you, is that when you do dispose of that vehicle, be it via trade-in or you sell it outright, then you have to recapture that deprecation and report it as taxable income.
The reason I don't worry about that, is because changes are so slim that you'll sell or trade in that car at a profit, it's not worth bothering with. Here's a rough (very rough) example.
You buy the car brand new in 2010 for $30,000 and immediately put it "in service" for your business. Heck, lets say you only use that car for business and nothing else. That makes it 100% business use. Now the depreciation amount of a vehicle on which you claim the per-mile deduction, depends on the tax year and the miles driven in that year. For example, in 2011 you could deduct 51 cents per mile. Of that, 22 cents per-mile was depreciation. In 2012 you could deduct 55.5 cents per mile, and of that 23 cents per mile was depreciation.
So lets use an average of 21 cents a mile over 5 years just for this scenario. Now a business vehicle traditionally puts one heck of a lot of miles on it. Easily more than 20K miles a year without even trying. So over 5 years you've to 100K miles on it. That's $21K of depreciation on a vehicle you paid $30K for. You'll probably be lucky to get $5K when you sell that car with 100K miles on it after 5 years. Even with recaptured depreciation your cost basis on the vehicle is $9K so you're still selling at a $4K loss. You've got no taxable gain on your sale of the vehicle. So why bother reporting it since you can't claim losses on the sale of personal property anyway?
Now my numbers, are "pulled out of thin air" just for the purposes of this scenario to show you the point here.
‎June 5, 2019
10:52 PM