sun burnt in aus

Hi

We're going to move back and are thinking of keeping our house in queensland. Does anyone have any thoughts or experiences on that. We were wondering about the pitfalls especially of holding onto property overseas.

durham_lad

spouse of scouse

I'd get some advice from a tax professional, especially if you plan to rent your Qld property after returning to the UK.

If any of your income is sourced in Australia, including rental income and bank interest, then you'd need to complete an ATO tax return every year (but only for your Australian income). Also, as a non-resident your tax liability on rental income would be much higher than that of a resident.
Australia and the UK do have a Taxation Agreement which could help mitigate that, but it's really something you need to seek expert advice on.

cyrian

You can nominate the UK home as your primary residence and the Aus home would be the second home.
The UK home is where you will be living and the address where HMRC can contact you in the country where you will be living.
Remember the UK MP scandal where they switched primary residence.
I don't know how Aus tax authorities will deal with the home in Aus.

durham_lad

spouse of scouse

Correct, unfortunately! If you already own a property anywhere in the world, the additional stamp duty applies when purchasing in the UK. I say UK but I really only have experience with England, might be worth the OP checking out if it's across the board.

sun burnt in aus

I get what people are saying and understand there are taxes and I will be seeking professional help, but what has the person on the ground found. Was it worth the hassle to keep your house on the other side of the globe and pay all the extras and pour over tax legislation, or just dump it.

A bit of the situation that has me wondering is Alberta business, and therefore housing prices, are in a downward trend for the next couple years. Where as Queensland is stagnant but may recover somewhat over the next few years. The potential is to make a bit extra as the gap between the to regions grows, maybe an extra 20k on the eventual sale, but will it all get eaten up in taxes and accounting fees?

durham_lad

When we moved from England to the USA we kept our house in England and rented it out through an agent. We did this for 6 years and it was a bit of a pain, but that might be just me. The agent's fee was 15% and over 6 years we only ever had 1 profitable year as every year seemed to bring necessary repairs having to be done, plus we had to keep a profit and loss account to report on our US taxes each year. The upside came when we sold after 6 years as the house had doubled in value but that was purely a case of good luck. We sold it once we had Green Cards in the USA and knew we weren't moving back to it.

My brother did similar when he moved to Queensland and kept his house in England for 7 years. Again he never made any money on the rent which didn't even fully cover the mortgage and he was always sending money over to top it up. In his case the house lost about 20% of its value so he was "underwater" with the mortgage. He was so pleased when he finally had enough money to sell it and be done with the hassle.

SUPERCAD

there is talk of stamp duty changing very soon. One of the options is to change it seller pays stamp duty... anyway i sold my house there and only regretted it.. we are now on our way back to Australia it would have made the whole process a lot easier…You never know what will happen when you get back…