Patti29

I will be moving to Australia permanently next year on a parent visa and need advice on transferring funds from UK house sale /savings etc over to Australia as tax free as possible!. Any recommendations on international tax advisers please or personal experience on transferring not insignificant monies over to Oz?

abner

Not sure about any tax ramifications, but I do have one bit of advice about the actual currency transfer:

Avoid OzForex, a.k.a. OFX.

Our family dealt with them for many years, but our most recent attempt to transfer a 5-figure AUD sum ran into an endless and ridiculous amount of questioning around the source-of-funds and purpose of the transfer.

I recognise that Australian financial institutions' FOREX transactions are under greater recent scrutiny after scandals at CommBank and Westpac, but after giving up on the stressful nightmare we were facing at OFX, we pushed through the transfer without hassle at Westpac.

Beoz

My loose understanding is that you will be liable for any tax on profit from shifting exchange rates. If you move the money near the time you move then there is no profit there. It's when you may look to move it and the exchange rate has shifted in your favour from the time you initially moved.

I did ask my tax accountant about this and he said he has never dealt with such a case.

Patti29

OK thank you for the heads up. I do use a UK forex Co atm but heard good things about Westpac too.

im just paranoia about losing more money in the move as it's already been taxed twice so a 3rd go would be hard to swallow esp as I need every penny for my future in Oz and they'll have already taken the huge visa costs for the parent visa from me.

Interesting too about when to exchange, I'll remember that, thank you.

​​Sorry to reply to both together but I'm new here and learning how this all operates which seems quite complicated to an old non techie like myself. 🙄 😂

ianandhelena

You don't pay tax on savings.

ben3

you should most defiantly send with transfer wise. Hugely reputable company and by far the best rates you will find

spouse of scouse

My experiences over the past 6 years have been different, OFX have always offered better rates than Transferwise and I've never had any trouble at all with my transfers.

paulry

I've found OrbitRemit to be pretty good these last few transfers and slightly better value than OFX. The approach I take is to have all the apps and each time I transfer money use all of them to compare and then go with the cheapest. Service-wise I find them all to be much the same.

mpjdodge

Open bank accounts in the UK and Australia with HSBC. You can transfer money easily and quickly between your own accounts. If it's a premier account there are no fees only the 3% degraded exchange rate.
As it's not taxable income in the UK there will be no question over it's origin, you'll just be transferring your savings. Assuming of course you are selling your primary residence and it's therefore not subject to capital gains.
I have personally moved figures between my accounts with no problem. (100s of thousands) I think the limit is $200k per day.

Pulaski

Is that all? ...... That is an outrageously poor exchange rate/ cost!

Unless you want to throw money away, there are a number of better options than HSBC, with Transferwise commonly being recommended as currently offering the best overall cost for a transfer, of ½% fee and exchange at the published "mid rate". The difference between the "convenience" of HSBC and Transferwise would be £2,500 on a £100k transfer!

spouse of scouse

I just did a quick comparison between HSBC and OFX, transferring £100,000 to Australia.

OFX transfer with exchange rate of 1.8431 yields AU$184,310, this is the exchange spot rate, no fees. With a relatively large sum such as this you can call the broker desk and negotiate a better exchange rate.

HSBC transfer with exchange rate of 1.7961 yields AU$179,341 with a 3.48% transaction fee.

Even if HSBC waives fees for account holders, $5,000 is a significant difference.

paulry

It sure is. I'd say for most people it would take at least a couple of months to save up that much.

spouse of scouse

It's my Scottish heritage, I can't stand throwing money away and even worse, I can't stand other people throwing money away

ps I only compared HSBC and OFX, I'd always encourage people to shop around for the best rate especially if they have a large sum to transfer.

paulry

I'm the same with money, and if anything more generous to others than I am to myself.. As for unnecessary fees: We work hard for what we have, so the last people we should be wiling to needlessly give our money to are bwankers

...And don't get me started with estate agents

spouse of scouse

Agreed on all counts. Last time I sold a home in WA the fees were $22,000. Sold a house in the UK a couple of years back that was similarly priced, estate agent fees were £2,300. Hard to understand the difference, the only additional service the Australian agent provided over the UK one was they did the home opens/viewings, whereas in the UK you did your own. I actually prefer the latter, if potential buyers have any questions about the property or area the person who lives there is best placed to answer.

The agents here won't even let you be in the house when they're showing people around, you're banned from your own home

While in the UK I had to get used to dropping the 'real' in real estate agent, someone there once queried if that was opposed to a fake estate agent. While if you say 'estate agent' here, you have visions of people managing a stately pile.