Two scary words in tax reform are “fairness” and “simplification.”

In most cases, this combination raises your taxes and makes the law more complex.

The Tax Reform Act of 1986 gets high marks for its political shrewdness, but tax professionals agree that this reform was both unfair and excessively complex (consider that the 1986 Act created the passive-loss rules and revised the alternative minimum tax to great inequities, including taxing the deduction you claim for state income taxes).

As you likely know, tax reform is in the air again, and it will bring its share of good and bad news. But for your rental real estate loss deductions, the good news is that the reform being considered does not alter the beneficial strategies that are in this article.

This article takes the complexity out of a portion of those passive-loss rules and helps you put this information to use for your benefit. ... Log in to view full article.