Expenses

• The IRS provides a list of common rental property expenses. Among these is "local transportation expenses" and "travel expenses." The agency explains the transportation and travel expenses are deductible when the purpose is to collect rental income or to manage, conserve or maintain your rental property. As part of managing entails checking up on the property, your trips back and forth do qualify as expenses. As with other deductions, a measure of common sense applies; while it makes perfect sense to periodically check up on your property, expect to be challenged if you claim expenses for hourly or daily trips.
  
  

Local Transportation Expenses

• The IRS allows you to deduct any type of local transportation cost, including your own car costs, under the heading of local transportation expenses. If you take a bus to your property, the fare would be deductible. If you drive your car, you can choose between two methods: actual expenses or mileage rate. In the actual expense method, you may deduct vehicle depreciation, licenses, gas, oil, tolls, repairs, parking fees, insurance and fees in the same proportion as your business use of the vehicle. In the mileage rate system, you deduct a standard deduction for each mile traveled.
  
  

Travel Expenses

• Travel expenses, according to the IRS, are the costs associated with traveling away from home if the primary purpose is to collect rental income or to manage, conserve or maintain your rental property. If you have combined a secondary activity, such as a vacation, with your trip, you must proportion your costs to reflect the ratio of business to personal purpose. You may not deduct the cost of any portion of a trip to improve the property, because improvements themselves are depreciable.
  
  

Recordkeeping

• The IRS requires you to substantiate the expenses you claim for travel and all other purposes. Although it does not mandate any specific method of documentation, it does require that you prove the expenses with records such as bills, receipts and mileage logs. The only exceptions are if the entire expense (other than for lodging) is under $75 or receipts for the transportation expense are not readily available.