What property records do you need before work income ends?

Before you work out what a property might add to your future cashflow, gather the papers showing what you own and owe, alongside the rent and costs. Keep the date and source document with each amount.

Include purchase and improvement records even if they are old, because they may be needed when you sell. Keep confirmed facts apart from missing figures and questions about tax.

Which ownership and purchase records should you gather?

Find the purchase contract, settlement statement and papers showing the registered owners and their shares. Keep any later change of ownership with them.

• Record the purchase price, contract date and settlement date separately.
• Keep invoices for buying costs and later major work.
• Gather leases and records of when the property was rented, empty or used privately.
• Keep any valuation with its date, source and purpose.

A value estimate today does not replace the purchase records. If you lived in the property before renting it out, include evidence of those dates. The ATO's rental records checklist also identifies a valuation when a former home first becomes a rental.

Flag a missing valuation as a question rather than substituting today's estimate.

What should your loan and offset records show?

Gather a recent statement for each loan, its repayment terms and statements covering the period you want to understand. Note the balance date, interest rate and repayments due, including any scheduled change. Keep offset account statements separate from loan statements.

Collect records of extra borrowing and redraws, with evidence of what the money paid for. The ATO checklist asks for redraw purposes and refinancing documents, including whether extra amounts were for rental or private use. Do not infer a loan's purpose from the property securing it.

If the transaction history has gaps, mark them instead of filling them from memory.

The help guide on loan records and interest explains how those records fit together in PropRetire.

How do you match rent and costs for the same period?

Use rental statements to find rent received, fees withheld and bills paid for you. Match them with bank deposits and bills you paid yourself. Check whether fees have already been taken out before treating a deposit as gross rent.

• Gather rates, insurance, strata levies where relevant, and management statements.
• Include repair invoices and occasional bills, as well as monthly payments.
• Mark unpaid bills and rent owing separately from money already paid or received.

For your living expenses, Moneysmart's budget guide recommends checking bank statements and recording each expense's amount and payment timing. The next question, what is left of the rent after costs, is separate from gathering the evidence.

Which records should you keep for work and a sale?

Keep detailed invoices for repairs and improvements, with contracts for work done and before-and-after photographs. Include existing depreciation schedules and evidence of construction costs. The ATO lists these separately from ordinary running expenses.

Gathering them does not settle how each cost should be treated for tax.

If you sell, add the sale contract and settlement statement. Keep the selling agent's commission and advertising invoices, conveyancing costs and any capital gain or loss calculation. Include details of unclaimed capital expenses.

These belong with the purchase and ownership records, rather than replacing them.

How long do you need to keep property records?

This is the ATO's guidance on 16 October 2026, not every rule in the tax law, on its rental record-keeping page, updated 21 May 2026. The usual period is five years, but its starting point depends on the record and your circumstances.

For deductions, the ATO checklist says five years from lodging the tax return. Buying, owning and selling records must be kept for at least five years after disposal. Do not count from the purchase date and discard them while you still own the property.

Other records need different starting points. The ATO identifies your last claim for an asset's decline in value and the date a dispute is resolved. It also refers to when it is certain no further capital gains tax event can occur after acquiring or disposing of property.

The ATO also recommends keeping loss records until at least the amendment period ends for the assessment in which the tax loss is fully deducted or the net capital loss is fully applied. Check which rule applies before discarding a file.

Can you keep digital copies?

Yes. The ATO accepts paper or digital records. Copies must be true and clear, and records must be in English or readily translatable into English.

It recommends backing up digital records.

Keep separate records for each property. The ATO also specifies this for duplexes and subdivided property. Within each file, keep the original documents unchanged and place your notes beside them.

Check that scans show the whole page and remain readable.

What if a document or amount is missing?

Keep a list of gaps, naming the document and who to ask for a copy. Include the tax returns, assessments and written advice you already have. Leave an unknown amount unknown.

Enter zero only where a record supports it.

Keep questions about tax treatment for a registered tax agent. For figures already entered in PropRetire, records that need a newer figure explains when to update them. The finished file should let you follow each important amount back to its source, with unresolved questions still visible.