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any profits that he earned. Sec. 1.183-2(b)(1)-(9), Income Tax
Regs. The individual facts and circumstances of each case are
the primary test, and no factor or set of factors is necessarily
controlling. See Hendricks v. Commissioner, 32 F.3d 94, 98 (4th
Cir. 1994), affg. T.C. Memo. 1993-396; Brannen v. Commissioner,
722 F.2d 695, 704 (11th Cir. 1984), affg. 78 T.C. 471 (1982);
Keanini v. Commissioner, 94 T.C. 41, 46 (1990); Allen v.
Commissioner, 72 T.C. 28, 34 (1979); sec. 1.183-2(b), Income Tax
Regs.
Petitioners failed to identify the amount of time that
Mr. Lofstrom spent writing during the years at issue or whether
he had anything published.14 Nor did petitioners report any
gross or net income on their returns for Mr. Lofstrom’s writing
activities. Rather, petitioners reported a string of losses, in
the years at issue and in 3 prior years (from 1994 to 1998).
These factors, taken together, indicate that Mr. Lofstrom was not
involved in the writing activity for profit.15 See Zuckerman v.
Commissioner, T.C. Memo. 1984-192 (substantial income from other
14Petitioners claimed, in their answers to interrogatories,
that Mr. Lofstrom writes “many nights and weekends” and once had
“100 copies” of something “distributed free of charge.”
15The only information petitioners offered to prove
Mr. Lofstrom’s profit motive was a day-of-trial deluge of
miscellaneous handwritten notes, correspondence with publishers,
a typewritten “novel”, and hundreds of handwritten notes on
health, fitness, and dieting. We accord little weight to these
documents because Mr. Lofstrom did not testify.
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