I haven't used accessors in dealloc methods, but I haven't been as strict with inits. I'll be from now on.

In the former case, you may not have completely initialized the object yet; in the latter case, you may have partially destructed it. If you have custom accessors that reply on other properties of your object, this may be a problem. And you can't say with 100% confidence that you will never, ever make a custom accessor for that property.

So don't do it.

• In init methods (including initWithSomethingElse: methods), always assign the retained or copied object directly to the instance variable (in other words, myObject = [newObject retain], not self.myObject = newObject).
• In dealloc methods, always get the object directly from the instance variable before you send release to it (in other words, [myObject release], not [self.myObject release]).
• If you do write any custom accessor methods, they must, of course, directly access the instance variable. However, if an accessor for one property accesses another property, it should use property access for that.
• In any other method, always use property access, never direct access. You can use local variables if speed becomes a problem (for example, if profiling shows a lot of time spent in a getter), but don't worry about it until your profiler says otherwise.