If I do what you say and go back to the year I first purchased the machine and put in zero % use Turbotax won't let me do that so in reality the depreciation is zero because the depreciation value is based on % use for the business vs personal use (basically 1/5 of cost of machine * % use) from what I can tell.
I am not an expert at this but it seems like if I don't want to depreciate the piece of equipment I don't have to, even for this year, and I can't depreciate it for years it wasn't used for rentals (business use). If I had a piece of construction equipment for 10 years but didn't rent it out until the 10th year would I go back and re-file 10 years worth of taxes? Doesn't seem right.
The word "available" in the IRS definition seems so arbitrary. The equipment was so new when I purchased it I wasn't sure I wanted to include it in my rental fleet therefore I did not make it available for rent. Then in late August of 2023 I decided I would make it available for rent. So the percent use is number of hours rented divided by the hours from the date it was rented until the end of the year. This is my understanding from the way the questions are worded in Turbotax Deluxe which I am using. Maybe I need to get home and business.
