Tax implications of selling a long term rental

[Edward Fedorovich]

Tax implications of selling a long term rental property that has appreciated and been leveraged.

Hoping to better understand my current situation, appreciate any insight.

I have a home that I purchased in 2012 for 32k. I have about 20k in repairs and have rented it for about $1600 since then. Nashville had some rocketship appreciation over the last 7 years and the home is worth much more, 325k ish. I took a loan on it in the beginning of 2016 (it appraised for 325,000) to get more working capital. The loan amount was 238k, it is paid down to 217k now. Taking that loan helped me tremendously as I used the money to buy and renovate more houses to add to my portfolio but now I have a mortgage payment of $1617/month plus insurance, property taxes etc and the rent is $1600 plus I pay property taxes, insurance, property management. So, it's not positive cashflow anymore. 

I feel like eliminating that mortgage and taking the 75k+ profits to buy another rental property with good returns might be a good move but knowing I have so little invested in it, I wonder if it will create an issue for me because I have already taken the profits by leveraging the property back in 2016?

Rough math. And I may just not understand correctly... 

Paid 32k

rehab cost 20k (back in 2012)

took loan, now owe 217k

IF sold for 325k, I get 108k cash (and eliminate my mortgage payment)

But I will have profited 273k from what I have invested

estimated 15% long terms capital gains tax would have me owing almost 50k

Is this what I should expect? Any strategies I could employ if so? Thx in advance.

[Bill B.]

15% on $273k is a little under $41k a far cry from $50k  

You’ll also owe 25% depreciation recapture on 7 years of depreciation. But in your case that’s almost nothing. I’m going to assume you’re depreciating the 20k of Reno along with the 32k purchase price. So about 4% per year of 52k is about $2100 x 7 years is $14,400 times 25% $3600. 

So back of the envelope I would guess a little under $45k in capital gains and depreciation recapture.