Tax for hiring kids to help rental

[Lily Lee]

Hi. We have several rental property under personal name not LLC yet. My 12 and 14 years old have been helping with rental a lot especially over the summer, they pretty much did all the paintings plus lot other jobs. I've paid them each around $5000 into their own bank account.

I just learned about the wonderful tax benefit for hire kids, my question is -- since our rentals are not LLC owned, thus may not considered as 'business', can I still deduct the money paid to kids out of my rental income? if so, I guess line 19 'Other' on schedule E is the place to go or somewhere else?

Do I need to issue them w2?

Thanks in advance!

Lily