Lacerte has its own conversion to Drake. Why would I need this?

Use it — it is free and it handles the returns. It needs Lacerte's native data files, though, and depreciation is where vendor conversions are weakest. This is for what comes out short, and for assets that live outside the tax program entirely.

Does business-use percentage come across?

Into Drake, yes. It is worth noting the reverse is not true: Lacerte's own import has no field for business-use percentage or state prior depreciation, which is a reason this direction is the easier one.

Drake destination

Leaving Lacerte for Drake, minus the re-keying

This is the most common move in small-firm tax software, and depreciation is the item everyone checks first. Drake imports assets from a spreadsheet; Lacerte prints a schedule. Nothing in between exists, which is the gap this fills.

Convert a schedule $49 per schedule · first one free · totals tie or your money back

Print the detailed schedule, not the summary

Lacerte prints two variants and the difference matters here more than anywhere. The detailed one separates prior §179 and prior bonus from prior regular depreciation. The summary shows a single combined prior figure. We will not split a combined number back apart — writing a 0 into those components would quietly break your client's recapture the first time an asset is sold — so on a summary print we report them as missing and flag the rows for you. Take the extra minute in Lacerte and print the detailed version.

What Drake wants on the other end

Drake's 4562 import is positional: 104 columns in a fixed order, dates as MMDDYYYY text, data starting on row 2. It is the richest destination we support — separate Federal, State, AMT and Book blocks — so a Lacerte schedule that prints per-treatment figures loses nothing in the move. We fill what your schedule printed and leave the rest blank.

Do the whole book in one sitting

A firm switching suites is not converting one schedule, it is converting every client with fixed assets. The ten-pack exists for that, and November is the month to do it: the same work in March costs the same money and a great deal more of your attention.

Questions

Lacerte has its own conversion to Drake. Why would I need this?: Use it — it is free and it handles the returns. It needs Lacerte's native data files, though, and depreciation is where vendor conversions are weakest. This is for what comes out short, and for assets that live outside the tax program entirely.
Does business-use percentage come across?: Into Drake, yes. It is worth noting the reverse is not true: Lacerte's own import has no field for business-use percentage or state prior depreciation, which is a reason this direction is the easier one.