Originally Posted by Jennifer91:
While going through my tax stuff 
I realized that last year when my oldest child went away to college, I moved some daycare supplies into her room. After reading other posts, it looks like I use 100% of the square footage of my house PLUS a deck. Is this normal? I can show an auditor if needed, but some of the areas are just for storage. I'm I looking at this incorrectly? Does the room need to be for more than just storage for it to count?
EDIT: 0% of my house is used exclusively, I'm not talking about it being anything being an exclusive room, but 100% of my house is used in some way for day care. Is there anyone else who uses all of their square footage when figuring their time space%?
In order to claim a space 100% then that space has to be used for your daycare ONLY 100% of the time. Any space shared for daycare and your family can't be considered 100% business use. If you haven't already then you can add your daughter's room to your shared space but can't consider it as 100% business use if you use that room for any reason at all other than for daycare. Even a child care provider that has a room in her home dedicated to daycare (has nothing but daycare stuff in it and that is the space that the daycare kids use during business hours) can't claim the space as 100% business if her own children use the space such as if she has a young child of her own at home who she cares for in addition to DCK's or a school-age child of her own that goes in the room after-school. Technically even if you don't have children of your own that go into that space but allow your nieces, nephews or grandchildren, husband etc into the room occasionally to use the space you can't consider it 100% business because you are then using it for personal use.
100% business space means that you use that space ONLY for business purposes 100% of the time, no exceptions. Now if you turn your DD's room into daycare space and keep it locked during non business hours and your DD doesn't use it at all when she comes to visit or your husband doesn't use the room for anything other than for daycare business use then you can consider it 100% business space.
As for the deck ... only indoor square footage counts against your space %. Outdoor space doesn't count. I think if you create an enclosed patio (within code and blueprints etc. according to your local, state and fed regulations) then a deck can then count towards your space % because you are adding additional square footage to your home. You can also count your garage if you store daycare toys and supplies in there but only as shared space, not as 100% business use.