To write off a vacation as a business trip, you need a documented business purpose and must spend more than 50% of the days on business activities. Hotel, gas, and meals qualify, but entertainment like theme parks doesn't. Keep emails proving your intent before the trip.
I have a personal trip coming up. How do I make my personal trip business? The predetermined purpose of the trip must be business, and you need to be able to prove that if you're audited. Let's say I would like to go to Southern California for business. For my case, I could be expanding Insight Tax. Maybe then to prove it, I would want to have an email that I sent. That would be proof if the IRS asked that I did that. But let's say I decide to take my kids with me, my whole family. While I'm down there, maybe we go to Disneyland. Entertainment as an expense This is not a business tax deduction anymore as of 2018, but it doesn't mean that the days I'm down there aren't considered business and I can't write off the stay at my hotel, the gas, because I would have spent that gas if I had driven down. Any food I consume is automatically considered business purpose. More than 50% of your days on the trip need to be business in order for it to be considered a business trip. So that's how you write off a trip to make it business.
