Kitsune

Hello there. Interested in your thoughts about having two places, one in the USA and one in the UK.

American wife (me) and British husband live in the USA and it's good. So we're keeping our place here. But no family here in Texas. Our big city is not, alas, a holiday destination.

Deep roots and much-loved family in the UK. We have lived there several times over the years. And we visit every year.

Four years from retirement, more or less, and thinking about buying a place in Cornwall (decided before Poldark, bty). Yep, been there multiple times. Yep, it's cold and rainy sometimes. Yep, three hours from London. We're okay with that.

Just beginning to research the tax consequences of living in two places, say half the year in the USA and half the year in Cornwall.

Yes, we could rent in Cornwall, but would really prefer to have a place of our own, even if it's just a garden shed. And no renters/home exchange programs for us, because one of us doesn't like strangers living in our home.

So our place in Cornwall would stay empty except for friends and family. A bit anti-social to do that, but if we're planning to retire there eventually, perhaps the arrangement could be accepted for a time. We have plenty of family to keep the place occupied and the plan is to hire one of our family members to look after the place. She wants to do this.

Found a link to a tax specialist based in the USA, taxesforexpats.com Anybody heard of these people?

Way too much about me! My real business here is seeking your opinions and thoughts. Is there anyone else out there who is doing/has done this? Traveling between the two countries? Was it/is it happy? What were the unexpected difficulties?

Grateful for any responses.

Many thanks -

not2old

outside of the visa requirements or that you can carry the financial load - then there is no reason to not live on each side of the pond if it meets your lifestyle choices.

Why just the US & the UK, you also have Europe which many Brits find a place in the sun during the winter months.

Have fun, explore, go for it ....

rebeccajo

Are you already a British citizen? Is your husband a USC?

durham_lad

We also live in Texas, north of Houston, and for very similar reasons to yourselves have decided to do just what you plan, set up a home in England (Yorkshire in our case) and split our time between the 2 places, starting next year.

In our case we are both dual US/UK citizens, born in the UK and most of our family are still there.

Assuming you have visa's sorted out for a permanent stay in the UK then the biggest hurdle you will face I think is the complicated tax situation. (Assuming of course you can handle the expense and hassle of maintaining 2 places).

Someone else may be able to answer your tax questions, I am far from an expert on this.

not2old

seems like you have it all worked out, although - do you have any reservations or obstacles that would prevent you from doing this?

Richard8655

As far as the tax situation, you have to decide which country is your primary residence to which you owe taxes. A tax treaty exists between USA and UK, so you shouldn't be double taxed in case you have income from either or both countries. Nevertheless, as a US citizen the US requires that you file an annual tax return on all worldwide income regardless of where you live.

Also, no-charge NHS coverage might not be officially available in UK if that is not where you're considered settled and your primary residence.

But sounds like a very interesting way to spend upcoming retirement years.

robin1234

My wife and I are embarking on this project. I'm a dual citizen, she is a US citizen (she was a UK resident but abandoned the status in 1991.)

Our permanent home for many years has been in New York State, and that still remains her primary home. We bought a leasehold flat in a small market town in Norfolk a few months ago, and I now consider that my primary home (I updated my British driving licence, registered to vote, am set up with utilities, council tax & TV licence, and I registered at the doctors as an NHS patient.) I wrote a letter to the HMRC telling them I'm a resident, but didn't hear back from them yet.

I'll visit the U.S. for a couple of months a year, she'll visit here once or twice a year... subject to being admitted. She's never had a problem up till now, but being retired and owning a home in England may raise red flags at some point. If/when she wants to settle here permanently, we will apply for the visa for her. First, though, I think we would want to downsize to a condo or similar in America, because right now we own a huge decrepit Victorian house with acres of land, not a convenient property to leave vacant for months at a time.

Tax has yet to be tackled. I'll be paying tax in the UK now, including on my US SS, and continuing to file married filing jointly in the US. In retirement, tax is generally more complex than when salaried, so obviously the U.S./UK dimension is a further complication...

robin1234

I would also mention that we have two adult children who are dual citizens. One lives in the US and the other lives in the UK. This obviously factors into our long term plans, although at any time either or both could move to the other country or vice versa.

Kitsune

Wow, thank you for these replies! I don't have it all figured out and your replies have been most helpful.

First, to Jerseygirl who snipped out the web address of the tax people I found: I did not think that including a link would look like spam, but of course it does. Apologies, I'll be more careful in the future.

To not2old: You're right of course, but we're silly. Nothing beats Whitsands Bay and our hearts will not listen to reason on that.

To rebeccajo: I am a US citizen, hubby is a British citizen. He plans to apply for US citizenship this year. About time. I will have to jump though some UK visa/settlement hoops.

durham_lad: Please keep posting on how it goes for you, if you have time! Would love to hear how often you actually travel, what happens to your respective houses when you're not there, are you happy etc. By the way we live in Houston. Hmmm...

To not2old again: Nothing keeps us from taking this step but I research big decisions like this to the nth degree.

To Richard8655: My husband is eligible for NHS due to his previous years of contributions before he met me and left the UK. My NHS status is on my to-do list. I don't think they would treat me for free...but I'll check on it.

To robin1234: Please, if you have time, keep posting! I would be interested in your downsizing decision-making process or anything else you might care to post about. Our Texas house is not decrepit yet, but is entering an age of needing maintenance. We also have two grown-up children. But children move all over the place, don't they?

Thank you so, so much.

Shirtback

Pedant mode: no he isn't. As a British citizen, he will be eligible as soon as he returns to the UK to reside there permanently. Contributions (I assume you mean NI?) are irrelevant.
/pedant mode.

Jerseygirl

Kitsune...I realise you are not trying to spam. Please PM me with the link I snipped from your opening post and I will re-instate it. Thanks,

cyrian

Kitsune
Why don't you consider renting initially say for 6 months to allow you to get to know the UK housing market and where exactly you want to live.
We have friends who live in Florida (winter) and France (summer) and they rent the condo in France for the entire year. The owner looks after the property when they are not there.
UK home insurers don't like houses to be empty for long periods (burst pipes etc ) - you would need to check out insurance policies.
Good luck

durham_lad

This is similar to our plans for the first year. We found it difficult to rent somewhere for just for 6 months when we did a trial run in 2011 in the place we want to live, but did find a nice 3 bed unfurnished house. We then had to furnish and empty the house before leaving, but it was a good experience and next year we'll look to rent for 12 months.

robin1234

That's a good point about house insurance. We avoided that potential problem by buying a leasehold flat. There is an annual maintenance charge, one of the elements it covers is homeowners insurance. (Similar in the US, where the monthly service fee in a condo usually covers homeowners insurance.)

This leaves us without home contents insurance, on that front we consider ourselves self insured at present.

Kitsune

Shirtback, you can be as pedantic as you want, it's helpful. Yes, I meant NI contributions, and actually I did not know he would be eligible just because he's a citizen. However, we won't be residing there full time for a while yet, so we're probably going to have to cover ourselves with US private health insurance for the 5 or so months we plan to spend in the UK each year.