@Jered010692 I notice you are not the originator of this thread, but are an add-on. You 'really" need to start your own thread, because your message by itself does not provide enough pertinent information to provide you a "definitive" answer. However,
I purchased a mobile home park for $1,008,000 and the county tax assessor has it as just land at $507,000 with 0 improvements. Can I depreciate the remainder $501,000 as improvements at 15 years?
What the county property appraiser valued it at has not bearing on this. You depreciate based on the "LOWER" of what you paid for it, or the FMV on the date placed in service. Whichever is "lower".
Tax appraisers do not appraise property for it's FMV. They appraise it for it's tax value. Typically, that will be on average 30% less than the FMV. So the tax value assessed by the property appraiser can not be used except as an absolute last resort - and if it is the last resort you will have to prove you tried every other avenue available to you at the time, should you ever be called out and audited on it by the IRS.
Also, keep in mind that depreciation is not a permanent deduction either. If/when you sell or otherwise dispose of the property, all prior years depreciation is recaptured and taxed in the year of sale. Two things about the recapture in the year of sale that can possibly hurt.
1) Recaptured depreciation is added to and increases your AGI.
2) The higher AGI has the potential to bump you into the next higher tax bracket, depending on the numbers.
I myself prefer to keep the depreciation I'm required to take on my properties, as low as a legally can. Especially since rental property "generally" operates at a loss every year on paper, when it comes tax time.
As for bonus depreciation, if you take it and depreciate the entire cost in the first year, and then sell the property two years later, every penny of that entire cost (after losses) will be added to your AGI in the tax year of the sale.
