Thursday, April 02, 2009

A boost for equipment buyers


With the tax-filing deadline fast approaching, we figured a tax-related item here would be appropriate. We recommend that business owners review Section 179 of the tax code because it might be helpful to your aggregates operation. Section 179 allows a small business to deduct, for the current tax year, the full purchase price of financed or leased equipment that qualifies for the deduction. All businesses need equipment on an ongoing basis, be it machinery, computers, software, office furniture, vehicles or other tangible goods. It's likely that your business has purchased many of these goods during the past year, and will do so again. Section 179 is designed to make purchasing that equipment during this calendar year financially attractive. The equipment purchased or leased must be within the specified dollar limits of Section 179, and the equipment must be placed into service in the same tax year that the deduction is being taken. For tax year 2009, this means the equipment must be put into service between Jan. 1, 2009, and Dec. 31, 2009. After the Economic Stimulus Act of 2008 was passed, the deduction limits rose to $250,000 (from $125,000), and the total amount of equipment allowed for purchase increased to $800,000 (from $500,000). These limits were set to expire for 2009, but were extended until Dec. 31 under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Look through Section179.org and determine whether this continued benefit in the tax code will benefit you this year. -- Brian Richesson

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