Just to outline the situation: you are enabled as a self-employed person through a sole proprietor. Student, secondary occupation or main occupation, it doesn’t really matter.
What interesting cost then quickly springs to mind? Right, that monthly rent from your house or flat. But can you simply bring in the rent from your house or flat?
Beware of your rental contract!
You will often find clauses in a rental contract that prohibit using the property for professional purposes.
That sounds like a vague term ‘for professional purposes’, but it means as much as: bringing rent into your accounts. Whether you bring in all the rent or one euro of rent, the entire lease then falls under professional use.
Exercising a self-employed activity in the rental property for some home work therefore does not fall under professional use. The ‘no professional use’ clause simply means: do not enter a single euro of rent from your house or flat into your accounts!
Why is this important for your rental?
The tax impact for your landlord changes (drastically) as soon as you bring in one euro of rent. The entire rental amount is then taxed differently in your landlord’s tax return.
Not just the amount of rent you enter in your accounts! No, for your landlord, the entire rental amount will be taxed differently.
Via the clause in your rental contract, you will be liable for the additional tax cost if you decide to contribute part of the rent (behind your landlord’s back).
Contributing rent from your house or flat: how?
Then you can bring in the monthly rent based on a bank statement. You will (usually) not receive a monthly invoice from your rental amounts, so here you proceed on the basis of the bank statement for your accounts.
So bringing in the rent from your house or flat is quick for your accounting! So is that bank extract sufficient for tax audits? No, because the auditor will not be able to deduce sufficiently from that what you have actually paid for. But then you supplement it with your rental contract at the time of the audit, so you have sufficient proof.
Of course be careful to realistically include professional use in your accounts!
And what if you buy?
Then, of course, the cards are completely different again! Find out all about it in this article.
