Disclaimer: Valzotra does not provide tax, legal, or accounting advice. The information in this article is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional guidance. Consult a qualified tax professional before making decisions based on your specific situation.
Overview
Logging your hours is the day-to-day action that builds your compliance record. Each work log entry records when you worked, what you did, how long it took, and which property it was for. Over the course of a year, these entries accumulate into the documentation you need for material participation and REPS claims.
How it works
- Go to Financials > Work Logs and click Log work.
- Fill in the work log form:
| Field | Required | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Yes | The type of work you performed. Select from the dropdown. See Activity Types for the full list. |
| Hours | Yes | How long you spent on this work, in hours. Minimum increment is 0.25 hours (15 minutes). |
| Date | Yes | The date you performed the work. Defaults to today. |
| Property | No | The property this work relates to. Assigning a property ties the hours to that property's compliance totals. |
| Reservation | No | A specific reservation this work relates to. The list filters to reservations for the selected property. |
| Description | No | Free-text notes describing what you did. The more specific, the better for compliance purposes. |
- Click Log work to save the entry.
What makes a strong work log entry
The IRS values specificity. A strong entry includes:
- The correct activity category (e.g., Maintenance, not just "Other").
- An accurate hour count — do not round up significantly.
- A description that explains what you actually did (e.g., "Replaced kitchen faucet cartridge and tested water pressure" rather than "plumbing").
- Assignment to the correct property.
Qualifying vs. non-qualifying work
Not all rental-related activities count toward material participation or REPS hours. Generally:
Qualifying work includes activities where you are directly involved in managing, operating, or maintaining the property: meeting contractors on-site, handling guest check-ins, performing repairs, coordinating cleaning, inspecting the property, responding to guest messages.
Non-qualifying work typically includes: investment analysis or studying market trends, time spent in your role as an investor rather than operator, work performed by someone else (you can only count your own hours), and passive oversight where you are not actively making decisions.
When in doubt, log the hours and discuss the classification with your tax advisor. It is better to have a record you can later adjust than to have no record at all.
Limits & requirements
- You must have an active paid plan (Comply, Host, or Portfolio) to create work log entries.
- Category, hours, and date are required. All other fields are optional.
- Hours must be a positive number. The minimum increment is 0.25 hours (15 minutes).
- When you select a property, the reservation dropdown filters to show only reservations for that property.
- Team members with cleaner roles can log their own cleaning hours. Managers and admins can log any category.
FAQ
How small an increment can I log? The minimum is 0.25 hours (15 minutes). You can log in quarter-hour increments: 0.25, 0.50, 0.75, 1.00, and so on.
Should I log travel time to my property? Travel time to and from your rental property generally qualifies as material participation hours if the purpose of the trip is to perform work on the property. Log it under the "Travel" category and note the origin, destination, and purpose in the description. Consult your tax advisor for your specific situation.
Can I log hours for time spent on the phone with contractors? Yes. Time spent coordinating with contractors, vendors, or service providers about your rental property is generally qualifying work. Log it under "Admin" or the most relevant category and describe the activity.
Can I backdate a work log entry? Yes. You can set the date to any past date. However, the IRS places higher value on records created at or near the time the work was performed. The creation timestamp in the audit log shows when the entry was actually created. Try to log hours the same day whenever possible.
What if I do the same task every week? Create a separate entry for each occurrence. This builds a more detailed record than a single monthly summary. The date, hours, and description for each session strengthen your documentation.