We were unable to rent our garage apartment due to Covid restrictions, but did incur expenses in preparation to rent. is there any way to report this?

[MinhT1]

The expenses incurred in preparation to rent your garage are not tax deductible.

Rental expenses are only deductible from the date the garage is available on the rental market.

[Boburk]

Not a tax expert...but have rental property.  My understanding is that expenses used to prepare a property for rent is part of the cost basis of the property and is amortized as part of the depreciation over 27.5 years. 

Normally the profit made from the rental would be offset by the expenses of maintaining it (the expense is counted as a repair and not part of the cost basis of the property).

If you rented it in the past, I am not sure how that works if you had expenses but no income in 2020.  

[ColeenD3]

Yes, the improvements are added to the basis of the property, but there is still no depreciation deduction until the property is placed in service and available to rent.

[Critter-3]

If you wanted to rent the property and could have rented the property and did rent it in the past AND  you did not voluntarily take it out of service  THEN   on this year's Sch E you will simply have no income to report and no rental days (to keep it active in the program you must enter 1 day of rental use which is just a workaround)  then you can still take the operating expenses as usual along with the depreciation.   A lot of rentals will have this issue this year where you either could not rent it or the renters you had did not pay.   The IRS will be making allowances for this I am sure but keep excellent records in case of an audit.