Court Says IRS Wrong on Numerous Points Concerning Passive Loss Rules.

The IRS, in this case, reclassified a significant portion of the taxpayers' (a married couple) income from non-passive to passive resulting in an increase in the taxpayers' tax liability of over $120,000 for the two years at issue - 2009 and 2010.  The husband had practiced law, but then started working full-time as President of a property management company.  He was working half-time at the company during the tax years in issue.  He also was President of a company that provided telecommunications services to the properties that the property management company managed.  The couple had minority ownership interests in business entities that owned or operated the rental properties and adjoining golf courses that the property management company managed, and directly owned two rental properties, two percent of a third rental property and interests in 88 (in 2010) and 90 (in 2009) additional entities via a family trust.  They reported all of their income and losses from the various entities as non-passive, Schedule E income on the basis that the husband was a real estate professional under I.R.C. Sec. 469(c)(7) and that they had appropriately grouped their real estate and business activities.  The IRS claimed that the husband was not a 5 percent owner of the property management company, thus his services as an employee did not constitute material participation.  IRS also claimed that the husband was not a real estate professional and that the activities were not appropriately grouped.  The court agreed with the taxpayers, determining that the husband was a real estate professional on the basis that he owned at least 5 percent of the stock of the property management company.  The court determined that he had adequately substantiated his stock ownership and he performed more than 750 hours of services for the property management company - a company in the real property business.  The court also determined that the taxpayers had appropriately grouped their rental activities, rejecting the IRS argument that real estate professional couldn't group rental activities with non-rental activities to determine income and loss.  The court held that that Treas. Reg. Sec. 1.469-9(e)(3)(i) only governs grouping for purposes of determining material participation, and doesn't bar real estate professional from grouping rental activity with non-rental activity when determining income and loss (as the IRS argued).  Accordingly, the taxpayers had appropriately grouped their renal activity with the activities of the telecommunications company and the adjacent golf courses as an appropriate economic unit.  As such, the grouped non-rental activities were not substantial when compared to the aggregated rental activity.  The activities were under common control and, under Treas. Reg. Sec. 1.469-9(e)(3)(ii), the husband could count as material participation everything that he did in managing his own real estate interests - his work for the management company could count as work performed managing his real estate interests.  Note - in CCA 201427016 (Apr. 28, 2014), the IRS said that the aggregation election under Treas. Reg. Sec. 1.469-9(g) has no bearing on the issue of whether a taxpayer qualifies  as a real estate professional and the 750-hour test is not applied as to each separate activity.  This was not involved in the case.  Stanley v. United States, No. 5:14-CV-05236, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 153166 (W.D. Ark. Nov. 12, 2015).