Primary Residence Rent

[Cameron_parker]

I am a California homeowner and share a home with a roommate. We have an agreement for monthly rent although we share the dwelling and expenses. Is this taxable?

[MarilynG1]

If you want to report renting out part of your home as Rental Income, you can report the income and deduct a proportionate share of expenses against the income.

You can elect to have TurboTax calculate amounts for you. 

Click this link for more info on Renting Out Part of Your Home.

[Cameron_parker]

I actually would prefer not to include this as income since this is not an investment property for me. It’s my home that I share and have my roommate compensate me essentially for covering part of my mortgage. 

[JeffreyR77]

You can treat the amount received from your roommate as shared expenses and not taxable income.

If you want to consider the amount received as rent, then it would be a not-for-profit rental which is covered in IRS Publication 523 on page 16.

Otherwise any amounts received from your room-mate is shared expenses and not reported on your federal tax return.
You can still deduct the mortgage interest and property taxes as itemized deductions on Schedule A of the tax return as the owner of the property.