We bought a new home in 2017, with the intention to demolish and build a new home to be used as primary residence. The process is rather long, so we rented it out until Feb 2019 (we never lived there). Right now the house is being constructed and will be completed in 2021 at which point we'll move in and probably rent out our current house.
I've reported rental income for tax year 2017 and 2018. Due to high property tax in the area, both years had a rental loss. I will have a loss for 2019 as well. The house was demolished in Aug 2019 for construction (between Feb and Aug last year it was vacant). I have a few questions:
1. Should we report "we stopped using the asset for business" for 2019? If so, was it Feb or Aug?
2. When I was reading through pub 527, it mentioned "Presumption of Profits" in that we can only carryover rental loss if we are "presumed to be profitable", and IRS requires for 3 years in 5 years period I need to have a profit, and it doesn't look like I will. Should I file 5213? The form is rather confusing wrt how much postponement it can have - the end of 4th year or 5th. I won't have a rental profit until 2021.
Any suggestions how I should handle this?
