Anecdote of the Week

THERE ARE WHEELS AND THERE ARE WHEELS

It is hardly unusual to see a business where the owner is writing off one or more cars – commonplace of course is the car for the business owner, often done at 100% even though it’s only maybe 30% business. There are other times when we also see a write-off (whether it is depreciation or car leases) for family members. One of our cases in particular stands out – it involved a manufacturing operation, and the owner (presumably with some help from his accountant) had on his books his personal and his wife’s vehicles. He wrote them off entirely in the year of acquisition, posting them as machinery and equipment for the business. While that was of course clearly incorrect, what made this particularly notable was that one of the cars was a Rolls Royce, and the other a Maserati – each one of them costing in excess of $200,000, and both of them acquired in the same year