The material participation report

What the report shows

For each property and tax year, Field Ledger totals the qualifying activity hours you've recorded and compares them to two markers: the 100-hour and 500-hour thresholds. A status badge reads “Reached” or “Below” — never “pass” or “fail,” because reaching a number is not the same as qualifying.

Open it from the dashboard's per-property cards or the Material Participation summary page.

How to build an accurate total

1. Log your work as Activity entries with honest hours and a clear description (see Capturing entries).
2. Assign each activity to the correct property and date.
3. Confirm your drafts so the hours materialize into the ledger.
4. Open the report and use Refresh to see the latest totals per property.

What is counted — and what is not

Field Ledger is deliberately conservative so it never overstates your position:

• Travel time is captured but not auto-counted. A trip proves where you went, not that the drive itself was participation, so trip hours are not added to your material-participation total automatically. You and your CPA decide whether any of it belongs there.
• Investor-type work is excluded. Activities that read as investor or non-managerial work (for example, reviewing financials or researching the market) are treated as non-qualifying, per the §469 rules.
• You confirm every hour. Only hours from entries you've reviewed and saved are counted.

Mileage at the standard rate

The report also shows a “$X at standard mileage rate” figure. It counts only miles for which you stated a business purpose — the rest are surfaced separately on an amber note so nothing is silently dropped. Stating the purpose on a trip is what lets a mile count toward that figure.

Related articles

• Capturing entries
• Guest stays
• Exporting to your CPA