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Home Ownership

Track home ownership costs, mortgage, and property expenses

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Passing Your House to Your Kids Without Probate: How Transfer-on-Death and Lady Bird Deeds Work

A transfer-on-death deed names a beneficiary for your house the way you would for a bank account — recorded now, revocable any time, effective only at death. More than 30 states plus DC authorize one; Florida and Michigan use the Lady Bird (enhanced life estate) deed instead. Here is what each does, how to record one correctly, and the filing errors that send families back into a 9-to-18-month probate.

mike

estate-planningreal-estatehome-ownership

House Hacking Taxes: How to Split Your Duplex Between Schedule E and Home (and Keep the Section 121 Exclusion When You Sell)

A house hack is two tax properties under one roof — a Schedule E rental and a Schedule A home. Split shared costs by a documented percentage, depreciate only the rental half over 27.5 years, use up to $25,000 of rental losses against wages below $100,000 MAGI, and expect unrecaptured Section 1250 gain at up to 25% on prior depreciation when you sell.

mike

real-estatetax-planningdepreciation

California Proposition 19 and the End of the Old Parent-Child Property Tax Bargain: A 2026 Guide for Heirs of California Real Estate

How California's Proposition 19 replaced Section 63.1 for parent-child transfers after February 16, 2021 — the family home and farm rules, the one-year occupancy requirement, the BOE-19-P and BOE-266 filings, the $1,044,586 value cap floor, and the step-up-basis trade-off that determines whether to gift during life or transfer at death.

mike

real-estateestate-planningtax

Form 1099-S Demystified: How the Right Closing-Day Certification Can Spare You a Surprise Tax Bill on Your Home Sale

Form 1099-S reports the gross sale price of a home, not the net, which routinely triggers IRS CP2000 notices for sellers whose gain is fully excluded under Section 121. This guide explains the Rev. Proc. 2007-12 certification that lets qualifying principal-residence sales bypass the form, the $250,000/$500,000 thresholds, the nonqualified use trap added in 2008, and how to defensibly report when the 1099-S cannot be skipped.

mike

real-estatetaxtax-compliance

Section 163(h) Mortgage Interest Deduction in 2026: $750K Cap, Grandfathered Loans, and HELOC Rules

Section 163(h) decides whether your largest Schedule A line is a $14,000 deduction or an $8,500 one. Here is how the permanent $750,000 TCJA cap, the grandfathered $1 million pre-2018 loans, the HELOC "substantial improvement" rule, and the 2026 return of the mortgage insurance premium deduction actually work — with worked examples and the records you need on audit.

mike

tax-deductionsreal-estatehome-ownership
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