Expense or Depreciate a New Mower?

[statman]

If I buy a new mower, do I have to depreciate it or can I write it off in one lump sum?

 

[MacLawnCo]

you can take sec 179 and write it all off in one year... or you can get about as creative as you want. make sure to talk to your accountant though

 

[hot_wheels21]

what do u mean by write it off? with like your taxes sorry explain this 2 me im only 15

 

[studentlawn]

Im no tax wizard but my CPA says anything that will have lasting value should be put on a depreciation schedule, your new mower would definitly fall under that category..

 

[Dman1214]

you can accelerate depreciation any time (usually to off set profits), however once u do there is no going back

 

[mtdman]

Section 179 it and get it all at once. That way you don't have to worry about depreciating it. Bush just raised the limit to $100 thousand, might as well use it.

 

[missytheaccountant]

The choice is yours. Regardless of the way you chose to handle it....it is still written off in depreciation. You either elect to depreciate it off in one year or over a period of probably seven years. The basic thing to consider is when you need the biggest write off of expense. If you don't have a great deal of income this year and aren't expecting to make any further purchases next year, you might want to consider the extended period of depreciation. If you write the entire costs off in depreciation this year, there will be no expense for the future years. There are also some other considerations if you plan on trading it or selling it in over the next few years; you will have to recapture some of the depreciation. Hope this helps.

 

[Kelly's Landscaping]

My accountant has told me I can expense items under 500 dollars but big-ticket items like my 10,000-dollar lawn mowers need to be depreciated. Which isn’t that bad since any deduction you cant use this year you can roll over to the next year and so forth till you finally make enough money to fully use the deduction. Atm I have around 52,000 in deductions waiting for next year’s taxes and that isn’t bad considering I don’t have a house yet.

 

[LwnmwrMan22]

I usually buy a new mower every other year. I run 2 mowers, therefore, buying a new mower every year, alternating years. Anyways, I depreciate the whole expense over 2 years, the length that I have the mower.

It's the same with a truck, 4 years. However long I keep a piece of equipment (large piece, trailer, truck, mower etc.,) that's how long it gets depreciated for. Basically, you want to take the depreication for however long it takes to pay for the piece of equipment.

If you can pay for the piece in one year, take the whole expense. If it takes 3 years, take the depreciation for 3 years.

 

[MacLawnCo]

keep in mind that once you fully depreciate a piece of equipment, when you sell it there are basicly two options.

First, you have the option of showing a gain on the sale. This would amount to whatever you get out of selling your old machine.

Second, would be to reduce the basis (amount of depreciation you can get out of a machine) of the new machine. That would amount to the price of the new machine less the gain from the old machine. Edit: I should add that to use this option, you need to sell and purchase like machines. ex: a truck for a truck

Hope this helps.