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The new depreciation rules have some (not much) leeway in choosing depreciation period. You can choose to depreciate some personal property faster, for example.
All the advice I've read so far suggests that depreciating something faster (or writing something off as current expense right away) is the most beneficial tax-wise.
And this logic works if your depreciations/deductions allow you to offset your income. If you are in a high tax bracket, you don't pay tax on that income, which is great.
However, if your property has a lot of expenses already, and not enough income to cover them, all you are doing is increasing the losses that you carry forward until you dispose of the property (sell the rental).
Upon sale, you pay 25% depreciation recapture tax, as well as capital gain tax (for most landlords, that's 15%)
If you depreciate more, you pay more of the 25% recapture tax. You don't pay as much if you elect to depreciate slower.
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