Amortizable life of a logo

[sdtaxman]

I am struggling to determine is logo development costs are amortizable over 60 months or 180 months. I am leaning to the 180 months but the client thinks is should be 60 months. The business has been around for over 20 years and they just recently updated and changed their logo. My research indicates it is like a trademark and that would lead to the 180 months. I am pretty sure in the past I have had clients that paid a few hundred dollars and that was run through advertising expense but this is about $6,000.

Thanks for your help.

[Golden Rocket]

Trademark

I would be hard-pressed to defend why a logo would not be amortizable the same as a trademark...

[TaxGuyBill]

I agree. It is an Intangible asset, which is depreciated over 180 months, unless you can find something that says otherwise.

https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/intangibles

https://www.irs.gov/publications/p535/ch08.html#en_US_2015_publink1000208962

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/197

Can you or the client find ANY support for 60 months? Under what Code section?