Qualified Joint Venture and Rental Property

[BlueLesPaul]

I am thinking of purchasing property for a rental, but . I have read through Pub 334 and 527, but I wanted to check to make sure I understood the tax consequences first.

1) If my wife and I jointly own the rental property, do we either need to file a partnership return or do a qualified joint venture, i.e., Is there any way we can just file one Schedule E if the property is jointly owned?
2) If my wife does not materially participate and we jointly own, it appears that we cannot do a QJV and must do a partnership, is that correct?
3) If only one of us owns the property, we can avoid having to worry about the partnership/QJV restrictions, correct?

[DevoCPA]

Just file on Sch E.

QJV's are for trade and businesses, the IRS wants to make sure you are paying all your SE tax. Rentals are usually passive activities, unless you are planning on short-term rentals like AirBnB or similar.

[BlueLesPaul]

That was my thought as well, but I wanted to be sure.  I figure it shouldn't increase my audit risk since the IRS wouldn't collect more taxes no matter how we pro-rata the income/expenses on one or more Sch E.