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Investors & landlords
No, the percentage--in your case 20%--remains the same. While the utilities will fluctuate based on the number of renters, rate charged per kilowatt hour, time of year, etc., the percentage of your home which serves as a rental needs to remain the same. Additionally, it is possible that for some months you will not have renters; however, if the property--or rooms in this case--are available for rent, then you can still deduct the expenses associated with those vacant rooms, i.e., depreciation, utilities, property taxes, mortgage interest, etc., even though there are no renters living in the vacant rooms. You stop deducting expenses when you take the rooms out of service. In other words, you are no longer offering them for rent.
Now, if want to charge your roommates separately for the utilities they use, you can do that. Adding the utility costs to the roommates rent just gets added to your gross rent received when you complete Schedule E for your rental. However, as noted herein, when allocating expenses to your rental it is all based on the percentage of your home that is used as a rental property.
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