Rental Income From Cell Phone Tower Lease

[jimchi]

AT&T is offering us about $2000 a month to install a cell phone tower on our 3 acre property. This of course will be taxable income to us.  Will we just report this as rent on our 1040 or will we need to get involved with depreciation and other more complicated calculations probably requiring us to have a CPA prepare our taxes? 

[tagteam · Accepted solution]

You should not have to "get involved with depreciation" either way (land is not depreciable), but you should have the contract reviewed by a legal counsel and/or a tax professional.

The income could be considered to be capital gain or ordinary (rental) income depending upon the terms of the contract (although it's probably the latter).