CPAs/tax experts, I have a question!

I have a friend that was telling me about his tax return (which he and his wife haven't filed yet) and when he told me about the deductions, one of them stuck out in my mind. He said that they deducted the cost of a fence they put in at their house as a home improvement or property improvement (sorry, I don't know the proper lingo). I was under the impression that you can't duduct this until you sell the house and then it is deducted from the capital gains. Am I correct, or is he? I wanted to check just in case he's wrong so I can let him know before they file and the IRS gets pissed.

 

Pretty sure they didn't take out a loan, and they certainly don't use the fence for business purposes!

Thanks for the replies!

 

Thanks again for the replies! He said his wife was going to bring the return to H&R Block to have them check it to see if they can get more back--if they find errors, are they required to fix them before the customer leaves, or can the customer just say "no thanks," leave, and file their return with errors on it? I'm curious because the amount that they said they are due back seems really high to me, and his wife is convinced they are due back more.

 

Sorry, one more question (I couldn't figure out how to edit my last post to add it there): How does the first time home buyer tax credit work? Is it basically a $7500 deduction, or do you actually get $7500 added to your tax return? Sorry for all the questions!