Rent

Deducting your rental costs can either be very easy, or very impossible
Logically, your office expenses are fully deductible, whether it is your rent, water, electricity or heating bills. However, there is a complication regarding the rent in particular, depending on the type of lease or rental agreement.

Several situations are indeed possible:

– Do you own the building where you work? Simple, there is no rent to be deducted. Be careful, some self-employed people will arrange for their management companies to rent part of their privately owned property. Don’t forget that this is taxable for the owner of the property…

– You rent a dedicated work space, separate from your home? It’s also very simple: your entire rent is deductible. The accounting proof? The commercial lease or rental service contract, for example as for co-working spaces.

– Do you use part of your rented accommodation for your “home office”? You can deduct a portion of your rent provided that

(i) the lease mentions a business use,

(ii) the professional portion of the salary allocated to the employee is mentioned in the report, and

(iii) it is formally registered.

You do not meet one of these requirements? In that case, deduction is not possible. Also note, that doesn’t mean you’ll be able to deduct 100% of the rent, but part of it based on the ratio between the professional surface and the total surface of your home (with a maximum of 15%).