The Passive Law Rules devised in the year 1986 is still misunderstood even decades later. The lawmakers divided the taxable activities into three, these are:

1. Portfolio bucket holding your stocks and bonds
2. Active business bucket for material participation business activities
3. Passive loss bucket for rentals and other non-material participation

Here is how you can benefit from rental losses.

1. Get out of jail free

Taxpayers with a modified adjusted gross income of $100,000 or lower can deduct up to $25,000 of rental property losses. The number drops by 50 cents per dollar once the income is above $100,000 and vanishes once the modified adjusted gross income touches $150,000,

2. Changes in operations

Once the modified adjusted gross income is over the prescribed limit for you and your spouse, the route to immediate benefit from rental property tax losses is different.

To benefit from rental property tax loss, you should fulfil the following two obligations:

1. You must have passive income from other sources or other properties
2. The couple must qualify as real estate professionals and materially participate in the rental property.

3. Total release

To get the tax deductions resting in the bucket, completely dispose of your property to a third party. The capital gain or loss is listed in the IRS Form 4797 as a Section 1231 capital gain or loss. The net gain is taxed at tax-favored capital gains rates, while the loss is restricted to $3,000, and the excess loss, if any, is carried to the next financial year.

On the IRS Form, 4797 is also listed as your gain attributable to the real-property depreciation. Your gain is finally settled on Schedule D and is taxed at real property depreciation recapture rates of 25 percent. Your current year’s tax loss goes to Schedule E. Your previous year’s tax losses go to Schedule E and combine with the current year’s tax loss. Now, the current year’s tax loss plus the previous year’s tax loss goes to IRS Form 1040, which offsets all income forms.