My accountant has been completing my returns for my live-in rental property since 2006 (purchase of my 2 family home). I live upstairs, and rent out the bottom. When calculating the depreciation on the house, how does it change from years prior? The way I calculated it differs from the 07 return. The unit has been rented out since I bought it. Do I use the date it was made available since 5/06 or 1/08? It's the same tenants. Also, turbo tax asks how much is business vs. personal, I assume 50/50 or 50% because I reside upstairs and manage downstairs? :confused:

You would actually treat the downstairs portion as a separate residence on the Schedule E.

The depreciation should NOT change from year to year once you are past the second year, since depreciation is normally 27.5-year straight line.

So, if I were to do my taxes next year myself, I assume I would have to get the schedule from my Accountant? I have nothing in the paperwork from years prior as to what number they used, except what was filed, and feel I need to work backwards first?

If you use off-the-shelf tax software like TaxCut, TaxAct or TurboTax, you do not NEED the schedule if you know what your property basis was and the exact date the property was put "on the market". With that information, the three tax softwares noted above plus any professional-level software can calculate the depreciation for the tax year with no problem.

Accountants are sometimes reluctant to give you information if you are no longer going to be their client. If the accountant won't give you the information, you should be able to determine what your accountant did by looking at your past years tax returns.