#bonus-depreciation
First-year bonus depreciation rules, qualifying property, and tax savings under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act
Leaving the cloud for a colo rack turns opex into capex — servers are 5-year MACRS property, but Section 179 or 100% bonus can expense them in year one.
More than 40% of your MACRS basis placed in service in Q4 forces the IRS mid-quarter convention on every asset — a 5-year purchase falls from 20% to 5%.
Since 2018, trading in a business vehicle is a taxable sale, not a tax-free swap — the trade allowance minus your adjusted basis is gain, depreciation is recaptured as ordinary income on Form 4797, and the new vehicle's depreciable basis is its full cost.
How a custom combine harvest crew builds a per-acre rate from its own fuel, labor, repair, depreciation and transport costs instead of the neighbor's price, tracks road expenses like crew housing, lowboy moves, rain days and IFTA reporting, handles seasonal and H-2A payroll, and depreciates a $500,000 combine as 7-year MACRS property using Section 179 and 100% bonus depreciation.
A crane rental company is three businesses sharing one yard — equipment, labor, and logistics. This guide covers 5-year MACRS treatment for cranes, the $2.5M Section 179 limit and permanent 100% bonus depreciation, splitting bare from operated rental in the chart of accounts, per-lift job costing including mobilization, and the utilization math behind an idle fleet that can cost $209,000 a year.
FAA Part 107 certification costs $175 for the knowledge test plus $5 per drone for registration, drone liability insurance runs $500 to $1,500 per year for $1 million coverage while hull runs 8 to 12 percent of aircraft value, and 2026 restores 100 percent bonus depreciation with a $2.56 million Section 179 limit — this guide shows how to expense certification, book prepaid insurance, depreciate a short-lived fleet, price per deliverable, and handle sales tax before your next flight.
A 10-bike e-bike rental fleet costs $15,000–$30,000 to launch, but each swappable battery lasts only 500–1,000 cycles and costs $400–$900 to replace — often within a year at rental utilization. This guide shows how to capitalize bikes and packs separately, depreciate under 2026 Section 179 and restored 100% bonus depreciation, reconcile net app payouts to gross revenue, and track utilization and revenue per bike per day before the next battery wave hits.
Parks earn their margin in the ledger. Submetering or RUBS recovers 80-100% of variable utility costs and typically lifts net income 20-30%, and a cost segregation study reclassifies 40-60% of depreciable basis into 5- and 15-year property that now qualifies for 100% bonus depreciation. This guide covers gross-up bill-back accounting, lot rent vs. home rent separation, intercompany flows between holding and management entities, Form 8594 allocation, and a monthly close checklist for manufactured home and RV parks.
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act ended the Section 45W Qualified Commercial Clean Vehicle Credit — the lesser of 15% of basis (30% for pure EVs) or incremental cost, capped at $7,500 under 14,000 lbs GVWR and $40,000 at or above — for vehicles acquired after September 30, 2025, along with the 30D and 25E credits. Only the Section 30C refueling-property credit survives, for property placed in service through June 30, 2026. Covers the acquisition-date and written-binding-contract tests that decide whether a vehicle you ordered still qualifies, how a fleet EV pencils out on total cost of ownership without federal money, and the Section 179, bonus depreciation, and per-VIN asset records that replace it.
For 2026, gig drivers deduct 72.5 cents per mile through June and 76 cents after, claim up to $25,000 in qualified tips as an above-the-line deduction, and expense vehicles at 100% bonus depreciation — if they log miles and tips contemporaneously and keep books on the right Schedule C lines.
2026 bonus is 40% under current law — $32K on an $80K machine, not $80K — unless OBBBA restores 100% retroactively; here's how to model the swing vs. Section 179 and keep the ledger straight.
Pet cremation businesses run three revenue models at once (tiered cremation service, veterinary referral commissions, and merchandise sales), and the retort itself depreciates as 7-year MACRS equipment eligible for 100% bonus depreciation on property placed in service after January 19, 2025 — not as a 39-year building improvement.
