All Forum Posts by: Ben Givens

Steve,

I really appreciate the advice, and you're right that the calculation may not be that messy, This solution makes perfect sense.

So I'm between Edward's and Brian's solution. I prefer Brian's but am concerned that the IRS would consider him living there for free as personal use. Are there any tax attorney's out there that can address that concern?

My wife and I are buying our first investment property. Our son will be living there to attend medical school over the next four years. It's a four bedrooms house, and he has already found three roommates each of who will pay $500 rent. Should our son also pay rent? Most rentals in the area go for $1500- $2500 so with or without his rent, we think it would fall into a "fair market value". However, from the IRS pub. 527, under personal use, example 3 says that if he pays rent than its not considered personal use implying that if he doesn't then it would be. We don't want to do the messy calculation of cutting his portion out of deductions and depreciation, but we also prefer not to have to claim as income money he would pay as rent (especially because we would likely be providing that money). Can someone give us advice. Thanks.