Yesterday, we had a look at some of the psychological advantages of having a separate home business workspace. But there are more than just psychological advantages. There are also very real financial advantages to keeping your home office separate from the rest of your home.

Financial advantages of a home office

When you have a separate home office, you have specific tax advantages. My home office is in its own room. Because of that, we can figure out how much each of the following can be deducted from our taxes:

* Portion of the mortgage payment.
* Portion of utilities.
* Depreciation for computer.
* Depreciation on the printer/fax
* Monthly Internet usage

It is important to note, however, that in order for you to take advantage of a separate home office space, you need to keep things strictly business. For example, half of my home office is taken up by storage. So I actually measure the 5 x 7 area that counts as my actually home office space (rather than the entire 10 x 14 room) and take that square footage as a percentage of the home.

Also, we bought my computer specifically for use in the home office. My husband doesn’t use it for anything. He has his own laptop for his needs. Our Internet usage is determined by the fact that 85% of the time the Internet is used at home, it is for my business.

You can see how keeping business separate from home life, you can reap certain financial rewards.