The Handbook of Professionally Managed Assets: A Definitive Guide to Profiting from Pooled Investments

Limited Partnerships and Real Estate Investment Trusts

Limited partnerships (LPs) were a heavily used form of investment vehicle prior to 1987, when their attractiveness was restricted by the Tax Reform Act of 1986 (TRA 86). Specifically, a series of tax statutes known as the passive loss rules significantly curtailed the use of limited partnerships to pass through tax losses to investors in excess of their amount of capital invested in the partnership. As a result, such terms as a 10-to-1 tax writeoff appeared in investment terminology, meaning that a limited partnership received $10 of tax losses for every $1 of capital invested in the limited ...