[brianmark]

Hi Roosh,
I know this is a kind of personal question, but I'm planning on releasing some writings like you and Neil Skywalker. I was wondering Can Travel for Travel Writing Be Expensed? Can you do it, because truthfully you can't write about travel unless you travel and live in these countries. I don't know Paul Thoroux, so I thought I'd ask you. Hopefully you can give me some answers. It would be nice if I could because this would take the bite out some of those long away from home trips which are basically research trips for the books! Thanks for any info you can provide. I love your books!

[johnwu]

(07-01-2012 09:31 PM)brianmark Wrote:  

Hi Roosh,
I know this is a kind of personal question, but I'm planning on releasing some writings like you and Neil Skywalker. I was wondering Can Travel for Travel Writing Be Expensed? Can you do it, because truthfully you can't write about travel unless you travel and live in these countries. I don't know Paul Thoroux, so I thought I'd ask you. Hopefully you can give me some answers. It would be nice if I could because this would take the bite out some of those long away from home trips which are basically research trips for the books! Thanks for any info you can provide. I love your books!

Absolutely, if you have a legitimate business that revolves around travel writing.
You must be able to prove that what you are doing is a business, and not a hobby though.

Travel expenses are meticulously looked at by the IRS.
There are two tests that the IRS uses to show if you are running a business.

The profit test: Earn profit in 3 of any consecutive 5 years you have profit motives.

Behavior test: Do you act like a business? Expertise? Time and effort spent? Track record? History of profit and losses? Business assets? Personal wealth? Nature of your activity?

You could carry out things that most people wouldn't consider a business, as long as you did it in a businesslike manner. Keep excellent business records. Make sure you have separate bank accounts for business and personal activities. Draw up a business plan with your projections for losses and profits in the future. Have a website, have business cards, have all your business licenses necessary, be in a professional organization dedicated to your business.

Also, you cannot deduct expenses if you aren't the owner of the company. In addition to this, if you own more than 10% of equity you cannot use the blanket per diem rate provided by the IRS for daily travel expenses, and instead must provide receipts for your activities.

If you are found to be a hobbyist, when you've been claiming to be a business, you're about to owe a lot of taxes. Income-producing activities also do NOT count as being in business. So there are many deductions that you'd be able to normally take as a business, but you cannot for income-producing activities. Usually things like interest/capital gains are included in this section. The difference between having a legitimate business and engaging in income-producing activities is that you must work continuously and regularly at the activity for it to be a business.

[Roosh]

It sure can, but there has to be some money coming in. You can't write a complete loss and call it a business.

When you file your personal taxes, you just set up your income and expenses in Schedule C. Turbotax and most software can handle that.

If you live outside of the USA for 11 out of 12 months, you may be able to use the foreign income exclusion deduction. It's still a grey area if location independents can use that, so ask an accountant.

[johnwu]

(07-02-2012 09:12 AM)Roosh Wrote:  

It sure can, but there has to be some money coming in. You can't write a complete loss and call it a business.

When you file your personal taxes, you just set up your income and expenses in Schedule C. Turbotax and most software can handle that.

If you live outside of the USA for 11 out of 12 months, you may be able to use the foreign income exclusion deduction. It's still a grey area if location independents can use that, so ask an accountant.

You actually can write off expenses even though you haven't been bringing in any profit, or passing the profit test of the IRS.

The key here is to have a forecast you have made, showing estimates of losses for the first few years, and then eventually getting profits in the later years, along with carrying out everything in a business like manner. In this situation it is a little trickier, but the point is to show to the IRS that you are trying to earn a profit, and not just having fun or deducting tax expenses for the hell of it. To prove you're a business just look at my post above.

You COULD run losses for nine years in a row (people have done so), and still be legally considered to be in business, as long as you appeared to be a legitimate business and not a hobby, so the deductions would be allowed under the eyes of the IRS.