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any reasonable means.” Sec. 1.469-5T(f)(4), Temporary Income Tax
Regs., 53 Fed. Reg. 5727 (Feb. 25, 1988).6 Although “reasonable
means” is interpreted broadly, we have held that the phrase does
not include a postevent “ballpark guesstimate”. See Fowler v.
Commissioner, supra; Goshorn v. Commissioner, T.C. Memo. 1993-
578.
Despite having made use of a Palm Pilot during 2001–-the
pages of which could have been printed out and submitted for
review–-petitioners submitted two items to establish the amount
of time Mrs. Harmon spent working on the property: Calendar
pages filled out by hand and a purported summary of the
activities shown on the calendar. Both items were compiled after
petitioners had been asked by respondent to produce documentation
in anticipation of trial.
Petitioner testified that she created the calendar by
referring to entries in her Palm Pilot. She compiled the summary
by estimating how long she had spent on the activity. For
example, on one day, she had noted in her Palm Pilot that she
painted. This translated into a calendar entry of “painting all
day” with a time of 10 hours noted on the summary; petitioner
6 Temporary regulations are entitled to the same weight as
final regulations. See Peterson Marital Trust v. Commissioner,
102 T.C. 790, 797 (1994), affd. 78 F.3d 795 (2d Cir. 1996); Truck
& Equip. Corp. v. Commissioner, 98 T.C. 141, 149 (1992).
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