Tax Write Off on a real estate auction loss

[Aamir Azam]

Situation: I am a new real estate investor and don't have an LLC or a formal business setup yet. I tried to purchase a multi unit home from auction.com but ended up losing my deposit ($60,000) since we found out that the squatting tenant and the bank owning the property still had their names on the deed. The complexity of the situation made us uncomfortable since California has strict eviction laws and we backed out since not all info was disclosed. This resulted in us losing our 60k deposit.

1. Can the entire amount of the good faith deposit be written off as a business loss? 

2. How much can be written off? 

3. How long would it take to get the full amount written off?

4. If I try and fight this in court to get my funds back, can the added legal expenses also be written off?

Thanks,

Aamir

[Joseph Palmiero]

Generally this would be a capital loss deductible on you income tax return up to $3000 per year with a carryover of the remaining balance to future years.