Question

Real Estate Agent that has no income but expenses

Forum|Forum|6 years ago
June 4, 2019
3 replies
0 views

CA Real Estate Agent that had expenses for 2016; dues, mileage, etc. However no income was generated. No 1099 needed. Do I add it to my tax return or wait until I receive an income?

TurboTax Premier Online

M

MichaelDC

Employee

Yes. You can still claim your real estate agent expenses, even though you had no income. A loss in your business can offset income in other areas of your return and reduce taxes/increase refund.

You can deduct expenses as long as you can prove that you opened or were in business in the year expenses were incurred. To be deductible, a business expense must be both ordinary and necessary. Please note that if you do not have profit for three out of five years, IRS might question your profit motive.

As a real estate agent, you are considered to be self-employed. You report both income (if any) and expenses on Schedule C/Business Income & Expenses.

TurboTax will guide you step by step through the process.

· Type in business expenses in the search box in the right hand corner of your screen

· Click jump to business expenses.

If you do have some income you can enter it on the same page.

Here's a good sampling of expenses for real estate agent from realtor.org that you may find helpful:

http://realtormag.realtor.org/sales-and-marketing/sponsored/intuit/9-tax-deductions-every-real-estat...

Z

Zique711

Hi,

The link that you provided doesn't go directly to the story.

9-tax-deductions-every-real-estate-agent can take.

http://realtormag.realtor.org/sales-and-marketing/sponsored/intuit/9-tax-deductions-every-real-estat...

T

trabical

Which software package should I use as a real estate agent with no income?

B

BillM223

While TurboTax Premier can create a Schedule C (schedule for self-employment income), Premier's ability to allow deductions is limited. Taxpayers who want to be able to use a broad range of business deductions on the sole proprietorship would be best off using Self-Employed (Online) or Home & Business (CD/download). The fact that you had no income in this tax year really doesn't affect this.

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R

REUser101

Hello,

So the loss can be reported the IRS, but what about the State taxes (Maine) , is it reported there also?

G

GeorgeM777

Report any and all losses on your federal return and amounts on your federal return will transfer to you ME return. To the extent, there are modifications to make, TurboTax will prompt you to make adjustments. In fact, one such adjustment that ME allows whereas the IRS will limit is in the area of a net operating loss (NOL). ME has decoupled from the federal NOL deduction limit equal to 80% of taxable income. NOL deductions disallowed due to this federal limitation may be deducted for ME tax purposes by claiming a subtraction modification.

@REUser101

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