Add an asset by hand

Most assets arrive by import. Some turn up one at a time, and those you enter yourself. The form asks for very little before it will accept the asset.

On a return's Assets tab, click Add assets, then Add single asset. The other routes on that menu are covered in Add assets to a return.

On the return's Book depr. tab, click Add asset. That opens the same form on its GAAP Book side; see Two sides: Tax and GAAP Book below.

Under Asset Details sit two tabs, Tax and GAAP Book, the same pair the asset page has. Asset Details is shared. Everything below the tabs belongs to whichever side is showing, and the side that is showing when you save decides what gets written.

Tax is the form described in the rest of this article. It is where the form opens from the Assets tab.

GAAP Book is for a book preparer. It asks for the description, cost, and placed-in-service date, plus the book settings: Useful Life in months, Salvage Value, Method, Convention, an optional Book In-Service Date, and accumulated book depreciation for an asset adopted mid-life. Click Add asset and it creates the asset and its GAAP book together, then returns you to the Book depr. tab.

An asset saved from the GAAP Book side has no tax class. Nothing is guessed. On the Assets tab it shows Needs attention and computes no tax depreciation until a tax preparer assigns its MACRS class: on the asset page, in the return's Assign MACRS classes list, or by importing a tax file whose Asset IDs match, which updates the matched assets in one pass. See Update existing assets when a file matches by Asset ID.

On the Tax side, six fields carry a red asterisk:

The last three arrive filled in, so in practice you type a description, a cost, and a date, and check that the depreciation settings match the asset.

Change any of them except the Convention, which the return works out for you and keeps disabled. On real property the recovery period is chosen for you and disabled too, with the hints "Auto-selected based on property type" and "Mid-month required for real property".

Pick Land — not depreciated as the Property Type. The hint under it reads "Land has an indefinite life and is not depreciated. DepreciationPro will track its basis and disposition separately."

The Recovery Period, Depreciation Method, and Convention controls disappear rather than lock, and the Elections section is replaced by a blue box: "Land is not depreciated. Section 179 and bonus depreciation do not apply. The full basis is retained and tracked for disposition." The asset computes $0 every year, stays off Form 4562, and keeps its full cost as basis until you dispose of it.

An asset you already recorded as something else can be changed to Land on its own page or through bulk edit. Selling it works like any other disposal; see Where disposals show up for how land is labelled on the 4797 sheet.

If you set a date past the end of the return's tax year, a red line appears under the field naming the cutoff and the year that does cover the date: "Placed-in-service date cannot be after 12/31/2026, the last day of tax year 2026. 3/1/2027 falls in tax year 2027." On an entity with a fiscal year end the cutoff is that entity's year end rather than 31 December. Fix it before saving.

Asset Template sits under Description. Pick one and it fills Property Type, Recovery Period, Method, and Convention in one go. No template elects ADS: the two real property templates use the General Depreciation System, 27.5 and 39 years, and electing ADS stays something you do yourself on the asset.

A blue line then confirms what it touched: "Filled by template: ", with a **(show 4 fields)** link that lists them. You can still change anything afterwards.

Some sections are always on the form. Others appear only when they apply.

Real property also gets land allocation fields inside Asset Details.

Pick Intangible / Capitalized Cost as the Property Type and the Recovery Period and Depreciation Method controls are replaced by three that describe how the asset amortizes:

All three are needed together. Leave any of them out and an amber line appears under the row naming exactly what is missing — "Recovery period (months), method and timing rule are needed before this asset amortizes. No federal tax treatment is inferred." The asset still saves; it is flagged for review and computes nothing until you come back and finish it.

Under those three sits a block of four optional fields. They are recorded on the asset and reported on the Form 4562 Part VI workpaper. None of them changes what the asset computes, and an intangible saved with all four blank behaves exactly as it did before.

Elections do not appear on an intangible. See Where the elections live on an asset for what shows in their place.

Salvage Value is under Depreciation Settings. Its hint says it plainly: "MACRS ignores this value; tracked for reference only." It becomes a real input only when the method is Units of Production.

This asset doesn't depreciate is a checkbox in Depreciation Settings. Tick it, pick a reason, and add an optional note. The asset then computes $0 and stays out of Form 4562 until you untick it.

Click Add asset. You land back on the return. A save that carries a warning, such as an intangible saved without its recovery settings, opens the new asset's own page instead, so the note is in front of you.

On the free tier a 300-asset cap is checked when you save, not before, so the button stays available and you get an upgrade prompt in place if you have hit it.

Hand entry suits the one-off addition. A whole register typed in by hand is a transcription exercise, and the prior-depreciation figures are where a typo costs the most. Bring a file in instead. See Add assets to a return.