I moved from my residence to a new home at mid year 2012 and rented out the property for the last half of the year and continue to rent it out. Can I treat it as my residence for half a year in 2012 and a rental for half a year in 2012 or must I treat it as a mixed-use property for 2012 and a rental property in 2013 if it remains a rental all of 2013?

“ Can I treat it as my residence for half a year in 2012 and a rental for half a year in 2012 or must I treat it as a mixed-use property for 2012 and a rental property in 2013 if it remains a rental all of 2013?”===========>For 2012 your home was a vacation home; you used personally as part year residence and rent during the remainder of the year. If you have a remaining loan on the property, the lender may have included some stipulation in your contract regarding the conversion of the property to a rental. If you are concerned, you may have your attorney review your loan contact. It may not be an issue, yet loan contracts vary and you want to have a clear understand of what you agreed to with the lender, before proceeding. You may call your state's real estate department and ask where you can get a copy of rental laws and tenant's rights applicable to your state. Renting property is like going into business, and you need to understand the law to avoid potential lawsuits.You also need to review your homeowner's association rules or the covenants, conditions and restrictions (CC&Rs) if they exist, to determine if there are any limits or restrictions regarding renting your property. For example, some condominium units allow owners to rent full time but not seasonal, or they may impose pet restrictions on tenants, but not on owners.You should contact your county's tax assessor's office and register your property as a rental, if necessary.
For 2012, as the pty was rented for 15 days or more and was used for [personal purposes for more than 14 days or 10% of the days rented, whichever is greater, allocable rental exp are allowed only to the extent of rental income. allocable rental exp are deducted in three separate steps; first, the int and taxes are deducted second, utilities and maint exp are deducted third, depre exp deducted. Exp are allocated between rental and personal days before limits are applied. for example, 50% of the exp must be allocated to rental purposes; 180/360=50%o for example, if your r/e tax an dint exp is $4000, and your rental income is $10,000 then you can deduct only $2000(50%rnetal use*$4,000) can be deducted from $10K income. And you can deduct the other $2K on Sch A of 1040 . For utilities and repairs=( assume $4000), then another $2K can be deducted form $10K income($4K*50% for rental use) and reaming rental income is $6K;$10k-$2K-$2K=$6K. so on.

NOTE; You MUST deduct the exp in the following order;1. Home mort int, r/e taxes, casualty and theft losses and rental exp not directly related to the rental pty(mgmt. fees, adv setc). 2. All other rental exp other than depre. 3. Depre exp.

When you dispose of the home as rental pty in the future, then yu need to recapture the unrecptured depre taken previously as ordinary income usually taxed at 25% UNLEESS your marginal tax rate’d be lower than 25%.

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