Question

Can I, a Pastor without a home office, but driving to a temporary location to hold service, is that mileage to my local library tax deductible?

Forum|Forum|5 years ago
May 6, 2021
2 replies
0 views

We had a contract on Sundays, for service at the Hampton in. For Bible Study, we often scheduled use of a room in our Local Library. We did not have our own location.

TurboTax Online

B

Bsch4477

Employee

If you are an employee you can’t deduct mileage.

O

Opus 17

Employee

The answer here is probably no, regardless of whether you were a W-2 employee or independent contractor.

1. Your mileage from home to your regular workplace and back again is never deductible; if you worked at both placed on the same day, the mileage between would usually be deductible. The hotel and library are your regular places of work, at least for the time being.

2. As an employee, that deduction was eliminated for 2018-2025 by the tax reform act. As a contractor, that mileage is not allowed for reason #1.

M

Movie1Author

Thank You! Next level... what if it is a temporary work place due to remodeling or a neighborhood outreach? A temporary place of less than a year?

O

Opus 17

Employee

@Movie1 wrote:

Thank You! Next level... what if it is a temporary work place due to remodeling or a neighborhood outreach? A temporary place of less than a year?

W-2 employees are never eligible to deduct work-related expenses including milage, due to a tax law change effective for 2018-2025. Most pastors are common-law employees and should receive a W-2, even though they are treated as self-employed for limited income tax purposes.

Even if you are an independent contractor and eligible to deduct work-related mileage, you never deduct your daily commute, even if the location changes from day to day.

Also see Figure B in publication 463 here.

https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p463.pdf

As you frame the question, you don't have a regular place of business and an alternate place of business at the same time. You have one regular place of business at a time, even though the specific location changes, such as due to remodeling.

If you have a regular place of work and an alternate place of work at the same time, you can always deduct mileage expenses from one location to another on the same day, and you can sometimes deduct mileage from your home to your alternate place of work, but only when you have a different main place of work.