How do I claim rental loss during the pandemic

[lopezroel58]

Tenant was laid off and law was passed by govt to prevent from being evicted.

[AnnetteB6]

You will not directly claim a loss based on rental income that you did not collect. 

Instead, you will be reporting a lower rental income amount than you would have under normal circumstances since some of your rent was not collected.  With the lower income and your normal rental expenses, the property may show an overall loss or greater loss than it would have if you had been able to collect all of your rent.  

[richinspirit]

I normally rent 2 bedrooms in my home in a university town through out the year. In March 2020 my student boarders moved out to continue their courses online at home for health safety reasons. Therefore I only had boarders for part of the year, until the vaccines were available, even though that would not  have been my choice. How do I accurately report this on my Schedule E? 

[macuser_22]

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@richinspirit wrote:

I normally rent 2 bedrooms in my home in a university town through out the year. In March 2020 my student boarders moved out to continue their courses online at home for health safety reasons. Therefore I only had boarders for part of the year, until the vaccines were available, even though that would not  have been my choice. How do I accurately report this on my Schedule E? 

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You report the rent that you received.    You are not taxed on what you did not received.  You  simply have less income to report.

[Carl]

You can not deduct or claim a loss on income that you never received and paid taxes on in the first place. You have no loss to claim anywhere on any tax return. All you have is less rental income to report and pay taxes on. That's it. There is no "loss".

[richinspirit]

Perhaps I was not specific enough in my question; if my rooms were not actually rented for the whole year how do I characterize that portion of my home? The guidance is not clear to me.

[Carl]

f you had a room that was available for rent for the entire 365 days of the year, yet you only actually rented it for say, 150 days, that room was still one hundred percent business use provided you did not utilize that room for any personal use for even one single day of the year.

So if I'm renting for $1 a day and only rented it 150 days, that means I have $150 of income to report. If I did not use that room for any personal use for one single day during the tax year, then expenses for the entire year are deductibe *as if* it was rented out every single day of the year.