How to set cost basis for a rehabbed rental property?

hartlenb

We buy value-add (ie rundown) properties that we then rehab and rent. The cost of the property is a small fraction of what we'd consider its cost basis as a rental property. The cost basis of the rental property is the acquisition costs (price, closing costs, etc) + rehab costs + holding costs (finance, utilities, etc).
As an example: let's say I have a property @ 111 Main St. I create a house asset account for it. I track all acquisition, rehab and holding expenses for this property using a tag. The respective expense totals are $20k, $50k and $10k. Once the first renter's lease starts, I'd like to start measuring the rental's performance against a cost basis of $80k. I'd like easily know/see that we are $80k into the rental property without having to go back through historical records.
I'm looking for ideas on how best to accomplish this in Quicken. In Quickbooks I think I could journal values between assets, but I can't figure out how to do this in Quicken?
Thanks in advance for your assistance.

NotACPA

What you call "Holding costs" do NOT add to the basis of the property.  They're current expenses that you can report on your tax return (unlike Basis, which only becomes a tax-return item when the property is sold).

Most of "acquisition costs" are part of basis ... but there are also items in the closing that are current expenses.

I'd suggest that you go to IRS.GOV and search for "rental property" for more info.

hartlenb

@NotACPA - I should have clarified that I"m also not a CPA and in this case cost basis may not be the right term as it an accounting term. I'm not trying to set the basis for capital gains or depreciation purposes. I'm looking to determine my "all in costs" on the investment for measuring performance and understanding my breakeven costs.