I have a rental property that I've rented for years, except 2018 it sat vacant and I didn't claim anything. No personal use either. But how do I get Turbo Tax to find it so the depreciation will just continue on as before?
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The treatment in this situation may depend on WHY it sat vacant. Was it available for rent? Fixing up for rent? Intended for personal use? Something else?
If you did not include the property on your Schedule E on your 2018 tax return, you will need to amend your 2018 return or add the property details to your 2019 tax return depending on the situation, see questions above.
TurboTax pulls tax data from the previous year, so if the property details were not included on your 2018 return, they won't transfer in to the 2019 return.
it sat vacant and I didn't claim anything.
If it sat vacant and you did not convert the property to personal use at the end of 2017, or the start of 2018, then you were "required" to claim depreciation on the property. If you did not rent *AND* did not make any attempt to rent the property out in 2018, then you "SHOULD" have converted it to personal use with a conversion date of 1/1/2018. If anything, you would do that to stop depreciation. However, that creates it's own issues that are specific to the turbotax program.
When you convert the property back to a rental, the program does not, can not, and will not "correctly" account for the prior depreciation taken unless you basically "lie" to the program and change your original "in service" date to "cancel out" the personal use period. It's a real cluster.
So at this point, the question is, was the property "available for rent" for all of 2018? If you lived in the property for one single day as your primary residence, 2nd home, vacation home or any other "personal pleasure" use, then your only correct answer to this question, is no.
So how should I fix it if it was available for rent the whole year but it didn't rent? It was definitely not used by me personally or anyone else at all.
(Thank you for great detailed answer so far)
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