I have 29 rental homes that are held under a business that financed with one commercial loan. Should I fill out one schedule E or 29?

[tagteam]

Up to three properties can be entered on each Schedule E form so you would need ten forms for twenty-nine separate properties.

However, if you qualify as a Real Estate Professional, you can make an election to group your properties (information at the link below) and file one Schedule E.

https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/issues/2014/aug/rental-taxes-20149906.html

[salisbury-blake]

Perfect, thanks! I am going to claim real estate professional this so may just try one schedule E. This will save me from having to prorate the mortgage interest write-off for each property.

[salisbury-blake]

I had a follow up question on this.  In the screen where it says, "Is this a rental property or royalty?" can I go through this process once by calling the property "29 house package" and inputting the income and expenses for all of it together? Or do I need to go through this process 29 times?

[AmyC]

If you are determined to go through this as one lump of 29 houses, you can. However, what happens if you sell a house?

I have been on the sales end and it isn't pretty. I urge you to think about your long term plans.

Also, perhaps you set this up through an LLC where it would be a business instead of rental properties. 

[Carl]

Wait a minute.... folks may be jumping the gun here.

I have 29 rental homes that are held under a business

What kind of business? This can matter BIG TIME!. I see you're using TurboTax Self-Employed. So it matters what kind of business owns the rentals. A single member LLC? A multi-member LLC? An S-Corp? A C-Corp? Partnership? Something else?

If the business is not a sole proprietorship or single member LLC, then you will *NOT* report your rental income/expenses on SCH E as a part of your personal 1040 tax return *AT* *ALL*. So please post back and let me know.

[tagteam]

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@salisbury-blake wrote:

...can I go through this process once by calling the property "29 house package" and inputting the income and expenses for all of it together? Or do I need to go through this process 29 times?

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You should be aware that you need to make both the real estate professional election and the election to group all rental properties as a single rental activity pursuant to Treas. Reg. §1.469-9(g).

However, TurboTax does not support the election for real estate professionals to aggregate their activities. 

See item #3 under Schedule E: https://digitalasset.intuit.com/DOCUMENT/A6nHfmlMg/010220-2019-unsupported-calcs-L1FQfTTgn.pdf

[salisbury-blake]

Sorry to not be more clear everyone, these 29 properties are held under an single member Delaware LLC while the other 5 my wife and I own are held in our names and I am claiming real estate professional.  The fact that TurboTax will not support aggregating will likely be a dealbreaker as invest in commercial real estate via K-1 that throws off losses that I use to offset the income from these 34 properties.  Can I get a double confirmation that this is not possible in TurboTax?

[tagteam]

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@salisbury-blake wrote:

Can I get a double confirmation that this is not possible in TurboTax?

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TurboTax does not support the election itself (see the link below). You can always group the properties using TurboTax  (i.e., combine all of the rentals into one) but you will have to make the actual election.

http://wecpas4u.com/~samwheel/images/Activity%20Grouping%20Election%20II.pdf

[salisbury-blake]

Ok perfect, this form doesn't look to difficult.  Is there a place for me to fill this out and scan and send this in with my TurboTax return when it is complete?

[tagteam]

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@salisbury-blake wrote:

Is there a place for me to fill this out and scan and send this in with my TurboTax return when it is complete?

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That is the problem - not really - which is why the election is not officially supported. You will likely have to print and mail your return including the printed (and completed) election form.