Splitting Rental Property after Divorce

[Gary]

I have a client that was divorced last year. They filed MFJ in 2008. The divorce lawyer told her she could claim half the rent and claim half the expenses. Is this true, and if so, how do you handle the depreciation?

[BOB W]

I have a client that was divorced last year. They filed MFJ in 2008. The divorce lawyer told her she could claim half the rent and claim half the expenses. Is this true, and if so, how do you handle the depreciation?

Most programs allow you to enter % of ownership. If you enter 50% the program will do the rest. Some of my older programs I had to reduce the assets in half for all to work.

[Koss]

Divorcing/Splitting

Which ex-spouse has custody of the building?

And did they sign Form 8332 to allow the other ex-spouse to claim the depreciation??

ROFLMAO




BMK

[Gary]

Form 8332

Form 8332 allows the non custodial parent to claim dependency. it has nothing to do with rental properties.

[Koss]

Form 8332

Dude, that was a joke



BMK

[Kram BergGold]

seriously now

First thanksfor the laugh. At 5:50 AM I needed it.
As 2008 was MFJ I assume the issue is 2009. If the house was still owned jointly by the husband and the wife then one person should prepare a Schedule E splitting the income and all deductions including depreciation 50-50 and each should report this on their return.

[Bees Knees]

Rental income is reported by the taxpayer that received the income. If they both received the income (for example, a deposit into a joint checking account at the time), then they each report their share of the income. If they owned the rental property jointly, and they jointly paid the expenses (for example, a check written out of a joint checking account), then they can split the rental expenses and each deduct their half.

It is possible for only one spouse to have the rental property in his or her name, and to have a checking account only in his or her name. If that is the case, only that spouse reports income and expenses.

[Gary]

Sorry

Koss:

Sorry for not getting the joke. Sometimes I'm a little dense.

Thank you all for responding.

Gary

[Koss]

Humor

No hard feelings.



Without my warped sense of humor, I would never make it through a tax season.

With that said, I suppose I do need to be a bit cautious.

Only a couple people have ever been banned from this message board by the administrators. The reasons were complex, and I never got the full picture. In large part, I think it was a lack of respect in their posts.

But I vaguely remember that one guy had developed a habit of occasionally posting fictitious stuff, with citations to IRC sections that did not actually exist, or references to "new legislation" that was completely bogus. The posts were very subtle, and the bogus ideas were just inside the limits of what could be real. People were genuinely confused, and couldn't tell when he was kidding around.

This certainly wasn't the only reason he was banned. And he wasn't doing it every day. But it was often enough that some folks saw it as a problem. I guess he was trying to use irony and humor to make a point somehow. But in this context, it was a bad idea. The stuff he was dreaming up was pretty far-fetched, but it wasn't totally inconceivable. Maybe he was trying to illustrate just how illogical and ridiculous the tax law sometimes is... that people couldn't tell what was fact and what was fiction. Perhaps his point was that one cannot rely too heavily on ordinary common sense or standard deductive reasoning when interpreting or applying the tax law. But he took it a little too far, I guess.

BMK