While with accrual accounting you would write off the entire cost of the lot when you made the purchase
Nope.
With accrual accounting one must carry inventory only claiming the cost when it sells.
I often cover the cost of 50 or 100 items purchased with a single or couple of sales, I would love to be able to claim the cost of the entire lot, but that is not legal. If I qualified for cash accounting, that would be possible.
Such are the complexities of claiming inventory but there is separation of the type of accounting you are declaring and using on your Schedule C. You are NOT required to declare inventory simply because you are using accrual accounting. Although those that declare and report inventory are generally required to use accrual accounting there are small business exceptions. There is nothing "illegal" about claiming the entire lot as a current year expense with either accrual or cash accounting although with the later it depends on when the cash from the expenditure is disbursed.
I spent a number of years working in financial and business accounting and doing tax preparation but suggest you talk to your tax accountant about the current laws as they pertain to accounting methods and inventory declaration as they often change year to year and I have been out of the game for awhile. However my inventory is still reported at $0 starting and $0 ending. I have always used accrual accounting for its simplicity and write off revenue and expenses when they occur so yes I write off lot purchases in the year when the expense is realized and the revenue from the sale of those items when they sell. The bottom line numbers all work out the same and the aggregate is what the IRS is looking at.
