What Is Listed Property?

Words you may need to know (see Glossary):

• Capitalized
• Commuting
• Improvement
• Recovery period
• Straight line method

Listed property is any of the following.

• Any passenger automobile.
• Any other property used for transportation, unless it is an excepted vehicle.
• Any property of a type generally used for entertainment, recreation, or amusement (including photographic, phonographic, communication, and video-recording equipment).
• Any computer and related peripheral equipment, unless it is used only at a regular business establishment and is owned or leased by the person operating the establishment. A regular business establishment includes a portion of a dwelling unit that is used both regularly and exclusively for business as discussed in Publication 587.
• Any cellular telephone (or similar telecommunication equipment).

Improvements to listed property. An improvement made to listed property that must be capitalized is treated as a new item of depreciable property. The recovery period and method of depreciation that apply to the listed property as a whole also apply to the improvement. For example, if you must depreciate the listed property using the straight line method, you must also depreciate the improvement using the straight line method.

Passenger Automobiles

A passenger automobile is any four-wheeled vehicle made primarily for use on public streets, roads, and highways and rated at 6,000 pounds or less of unloaded gross vehicle weight (6,000 pounds or less of gross vehicle weight for trucks and vans). It includes any part, component, or other item physically attached to the automobile or usually included in the purchase price of an automobile.

The following vehicles are not considered passenger automobiles for these purposes.

• An ambulance, hearse, or combination ambulance-hearse used directly in a trade or business.
• A vehicle used directly in the trade or business of transporting persons or property for pay or hire.

For a detailed discussion of passenger automobiles, including leased passenger automobiles, see Publication 463.

Other Property Used for Transportation

Other property used for transportation includes trucks, buses, boats, airplanes, motorcycles, and any other vehicles used to transport persons or goods.

Excepted vehicles. The following vehicles are not listed property.

• Clearly marked police and fire vehicles.
• Unmarked vehicles used by law enforcement officers if the use is officially authorized.
• Ambulances used as such and hearses used as such.
• Any vehicle with a loaded gross vehicle weight of over 14,000 pounds that is designed to carry cargo.
• Bucket trucks (cherry pickers), cement mixers, dump trucks (including garbage trucks), flatbed trucks, and refrigerated trucks.
• Combines, cranes and derricks, and forklifts.
• Qualified moving vans.
• Qualified specialized utility repair trucks.
• School buses used in transporting students and employees of schools.
• Other buses with a capacity of at least 20 passengers that are used as passenger buses.
• Tractors and other special purpose farm vehicles.

Clearly marked police and fire vehicle. A clearly marked police or fire vehicle is a vehicle that meets all the following requirements.

• It is owned or leased by a governmental unit or an agency or instrumentality of a governmental unit.
• It is required to be used for commuting by a police officer or fire fighter who, when not on a regular shift, is on call at all times.
• It is prohibited from being used for personal use (other than commuting) outside the limit of the police officer's arrest powers or the fire fighter's obligation to respond to an emergency.
• It is clearly marked with painted insignia or words that make it readily apparent that it is a police or fire vehicle. A marking on a license plate is not a clear marking for these purposes.

Qualified moving van. A qualified moving van is any truck or van used by a professional moving company for moving household or business goods if the following requirements are met.

• No personal use of the van is allowed other than for travel to and from a move site or for minor personal use, such as a stop for lunch on the way from one move site to another.
• Personal use for travel to and from a move site happens no more than five times a month on average.
• Personal use is limited to situations in which it is more convenient to the employer, because of the location of the employee's residence in relation to the location of the move site, for the van not to be returned to the employer's business location.

Qualified specialized utility repair truck. A truck is a qualified specialized utility truck if it is not a van or pickup truck and all the following apply.

• The truck was specifically designed for and is used to carry heavy tools, testing equipment, or parts.
• Shelves, racks, or other permanent interior construction has been installed to carry and store the tools, equipment, or parts and would make it unlikely that the truck would be used, other than minimally, for personal purposes.
• The employer requires the employee to drive the truck home in order to be able to respond in emergency situations for purposes of restoring or maintaining electricity, gas, telephone, water, sewer, or steam utility services.

Computers and Related Peripheral Equipment

A computer is a programmable, electronically activated device capable of accepting information, applying prescribed processes to the information, and supplying the results of those processes with or without human intervention. It consists of a central processing unit with extensive storage, logic, arithmetic, and control capabilities.

Related peripheral equipment is any auxiliary machine which is designed to be controlled by the central processing unit of a computer.

The following are neither computers nor related peripheral equipment.

• Any equipment that is an integral part of property that is not a computer.
• Typewriters, calculators, adding and accounting machines, copiers, duplicating equipment, and similar equipment.
• Equipment of a kind used primarily for the user's amusement or entertainment, such as video games.

Previous| First | Next

Publication Index | IRS-Forms Main | Home