Hard Assets

Tangible Asset

In accounting, any asset that can be seen and touched. Tangible assets include things that can be reproduced, such as widgets or a widget factory, and things that cannot be reproduced, such as the land upon which the widget factory is built. Tangible assets are comparatively easy to price, and therefore they are often used to express the value of a company. However, because they do not include intangible but still valuable things like patents and brand recognition, they may not truly express a company's value. Less commonly, tangible assets are called hard assets. See also: Intangible Assets.

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Hard assets. Hard assets are the tangible property of a company or partnership, such as the buildings, furniture, real estate, and other equipment it owns.

When you make a direct investment in hard assets, as you do when you invest in a direct participation program (DPP), you have an ownership interest in the actual assets rather than in shares of the corporation.

The profit, if any, that you realize from hard assets is dependent on their ability to produce revenue, as a rental property or a leased airplane might.