Alright, in this episode, we're going to cover how you can write off some
of your travel expenses related to your business or related
to your rental properties or related to your investments. So one of my favorite
ways to get deductions is to write things off that you're already paying for.
So like say if you've got a trip planned. Say you've got a trip
planned with your family and you want to go to Florida to visit the
beach. If you're just going to the beach to hang out with your family,
that's a personal trip. That's a family trip.
But what if there's something you could do?
What if you could tweak some of the details or be there for specific
reasons? And be able to write that trip off.
So I'm going to give you some details on how you could actually do
that. And of course in this podcast summary,
in the short podcast episodes that I do,
we're just going to be doing like the high-level review of it,
and give you some of the ideas, and then we're going you some,
like some of the tools, some of the templates and the specific tax laws
and strategies and exactly how to do it. But here's the,
here's the overhead view of, of the way that I look at travel expenses.
So if you're going to Florida, we'll go back to that example of going
to Florida with your family. You need to have a reason to go to
Florida. So I've, I've, I've got ah,
I live in Utah and a week or so ago we got like 18
inches of snow. Like we're not that high of elevation where I am.
We got a bunch of snow just in the hills right above us.
Just having a big snowstorm is not a reason to reason enough for a
deduction to go to Florida. And I know my wife would tell you otherwise,
but it's not a tax deductible reason to go to Florida.
So we've got to have another reason. So here are those types of reasons.
So if you've got, say you've got a client in Florida or you have
a vendor in Florida, or a supplier,
or a supplier. Say your job is a real estate agent or a real
estate investor and you're looking at properties in Florida and you need to be
at that property. You want to walk through it and see it and see
what it's like. You need to meet people.
If you're raising funds, if you're going there to a conference or a seminar.
I'm just kind of spitballing a bunch of different ideas, but if you need
to be there physically, that would be a reason to be in Florida.
And I'm going to break down some of the details in a minute,
but I'll give you a quick example of one of my clients.
So, or this isn't just one client,
but we've had plenty of clients do this where they want to go to
Florida. They want to write off this trip and they work remotely.
So, in their opinion, they go, or in their thinking,
they go, well, I'm going to be in Florida.
I'm going to be at the beach. I'm going to be working on my
computer at the beach. Therefore, I can write off the trip.
I would be, I would watch out for that. If you work remotely,
just by the mere fact that you are working in a place does not
mean that you can write off the travel to that place. So, I'd watch
out for that. As you know, I am all about opportunities and strategies and
implementing them, but that's not one of them.
You need to be there physically, like in person for a reason.
So remember, seminars, conferences,
trainings, seeing properties,
meeting people, suppliers, it could be meeting potential clients or existing clients.
You need to be there for a reason. And I'll,
I'll let you brainstorm all sorts of different ideas of why you would need
to be there in person and document it. Like,
if you've got to be there in person, document it. Document that meeting with
the person, document like when you met them,
what you did with them, just see if you've got a reason for that.
So now, when it, now it comes down to the specific,
like the deduction amount. So here's an example. So if you go and do
a trip in Florida, Thank Bye. And like it's,
if you're flying from Utah to Florida, it's like a six hour flight.
You don't want to just go for one night.
You might want to stay there longer. And if you're with the family,
they're going to want to stay even longer than that. So if you go
stay there for a week, like on one side,
you might think quick, well, I went and met a person.
Or I went, say I went to an eight hour conference for one of
the days I was there. So you're there six days.
You go to a conference one day. How much can you deduct if you're
there for business really one day out of the six?
And say the other five days you're just playing with your family and going
to the beach and stuff. So here's what you can write off.
You can write off your flight to and from Florida.
You had to be there in person to go to that conference, right?
Flight for you is deductible both ways.
Your hotel stay, if you have one business work day there,
I would deduct two hotel stays.
So you'd have two nights. So if it's reasonable that you get there the
day before, you got to spend that you spend
another night there and then you travel home. So that third day is a
travel day. So if you're only spending one day on business related things,
you're going to have two nights. Two hotel stays.
You're going to have three days of food because you got to travel that
you got to travel days on both ends of the business day.
So you got three days of food that you'd write off and the flights,
the hotels for the two days. So hopefully that that makes some sense on
on what you would write off. So now the other, what is it? So
that's three nights. the other three nights that you're there with the family.
Those would not be deductible. But in if your family is with you in
the same hotel room or the same Airbnb that you're renting,
that's completely fine. You can still write it off for those days for you.
So now here's here's a pointer I'd recommend.
If you. If you have. Like say you have your investment company that we've
talked about. It's an LLC and say you and your wife are owners of
it. Or you and your spouse are owners of it.
And say you've got kids that are employees.
If there's a reason for all of you to be there.
Say you all go to a conference. My if you got young kids like
I do that. My. Be impossible. But if you're all going to a property
to look at it. If they're all part of the decision making process.
Or if you're advertising for the business.
Or and we've got. If you're a social media influencer.
A content creator. If you all need to be there.
You're creating content. You're creating videos. That could be.
That could a reason for all of you to be there. So I just
want you to start thinking of these deductions differently.
And again that is one of my favorite ways to get deductions.
Is for something that you're already paying for. If you're already going to Florida
to avoid the 18 inches of snow like my wife wants to do.
We're gonna be spending that money anyways. Why don't we get a.
Deduction for it. Just we've got to tweak some of our facts and circumstances.
You're not just gonna go write it off. Just for the sake of writing
it off. But as long as you have the facts and circumstances that back
it up and you have documentation. You're gonna I would charge that that uh
the flight to and from. I would charge that on your LLC or your
business account. The hotel for the deductible days I would charge that on the
LLC or the business account. So just it'll start time hoping this episode just
starts getting to think about those travel expenses.
That you might be spending anyways but just have a reason to.
Go to these specific places of business reason that gets you there and some
of those those travel deductions could be deductible for you.
So that's that's it for today and have a good rest of the day.
