Hello,

So I am working as a physician independent contractor. I just moved to TX and currently do not have a car yet. I will be starting my job in 2 days. I rented a car yesterday (Thursday) to travel to the worksite for orientation, and was going to return it today. However, due to bad weather, I decided to extend my rental to cover just for today--Friday (when I'm not even using the car). Because Sunday the car rental place is closed (the day when I actually need the car), I would have to rent a car tomorrow anyway and return it on Monday (since I end work at 10pm and the car rental is closed on Sunday).

My question is:
(1) Would the car rental be deductible just for the days I work (so I would have to adjust the cost of the car rental to subtract Friday's and Monday's cost? I am not even using the car for personal reasons.

(2) When I do get my own car and travel with it, would I be able to deduct mileage too?

I'm confused because I thought we're not allowed to use both car rental and mileage (from my own car usage) for deductions. Please clarify. I'm trying to do everything properly.

Thank you so much.

Zip Code: 78744

I think whether you can deduct the cost of the rental car will follow the same rules as to whether the miles driven would be deductible.

Deductible miles includes driving between work sites, driving between your home and a temporary job site (for a position that will last a year or less), or driving to/from meetings, conferences, CMEs, etc. Having a home office in your apartment cam make commuting between your home and work deductible.

So please determine if you are using the rental car in connection with deductible mileage, and if so, make sure to include as part of your business expenses when you tally up those expenses for your taxes.

Let me know if this doesn't answer your question.

Zip Code: 01801

Hi, Andrew,

So if I decide to use my car rental as a business expense (not using my mileage from the car rental), will I also be able to use mileage in the future when I drive using my own car?

And for my car rental for 4 days (Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday) only used for work, the total was $230.62. I didn't drive the car on Friday at all--did not work that day. Would I be able to fully deduct $230.62 as a business expense or would I have to take 1/4 of the cost out when calculating the business expense?

Zip Code: 78744

Typically, you have to choose between basing your deduction on standard mileage rates or actual costs incurred for each car driven during the year. However, I don't think the car you rented is the same as the car that you'll be calculating the deduction based on standard mileage. So it seems to me that you can claim a portion of the car rental costs, and then also claim a deduction on your new car based on standard mileage rates.

Zip Code: 01801