gt6racer

Hi,
I'm an expat having lived here for the past 23 years and have both US and UK passports. I only go to the UK for a couple of weeks per year and don't have a house there any more. ( sold it 20 years ago ). I don't have any earnings in the UK other than a small amount of interest on savings.
It's a long story that I won't trouble you with, but the upshot is that I need to arrange accommodation for my elderly parents back in the UK. I have some liquid assets that I could use to buy a home, and so prefer this route to renting something for them. ( Actually I will buy it and rent it to them myself as they are on housing assistance).
Concerning the purchase/rental of the home, has anyone been through this ? Are there issues with sending a large amount of cash to the UK ? ( UK income Tax ?) I did a search and found some discussions about buying a vacation home in the UK, but not anyone who had done it.
I have also seen some discussion about setting up a business in the US that buys and then rents the house in the UK. This seems perfect for me - but don't know how to go about it. Can anyone steer me information on this ?
Lastly, I've ruled out bringing them here based upon lack of medical insurance. I am right that this route is not feasible ?

Thanks.

Bob

Welcome to BE!

Tax concerns, well I'll let others answer that, but there have been quite a few threads on people owning homes and having rental income so you should be able to find out quite a lot of recent info from that.

Sending money to the UK isn't a problem, xe.com hifx etc It's not income.

Setting up a company to do this, depends on your state.

Feasibility of bringing parents over, really depends on there ages, health and what state they'll move over to. Some make it doable, most don't. A couple of pretty recent, within the last couple of week threads on this too.

gt6racer

Bob,
Thanks for the reply. You mentioned that the state makes a difference. I'm in Michigan. My parents 78 and 73 - generally OK but on some meds. The research I did showed that they wouldn't get medicare for 5 years after moving, and private insurance at several thousands per month if available at all.
I did search again, but couldn't find detail on the business route. If anyone has this experience I'd really appreciate some pointers.

Jerseygirl

My sister and I arranged a mortgage with the Halifax years ago for my aged parents...the mortgage was in their name. It was an interest only repayment mortgage...the capital to be repayed upon their death or at the end of the mortgage period. They were living in a council house...mum was well in her 60's and dad couldn't work because he'd had several major heart attacks so they were on housing assistance. They lived about 60 miles away from us and needed a smaller one level home and needed to be nearer to close family. The assistance was transferred to pay their mortgage (about £20K). They both recently passed away...the bungalow was their only asset...when the capital was paid the equity was well below that for death duty. If I had owned the property it would have been subject to tax.

gt6racer

Thanks Jerseygirl. This is another possibility. Would the tax you refer to having to pay if you owned the house have been capital gains tax ? However, as the houses are now so expensive they couldn't afford a mortgage unless I give them a large downpayment, which I assume I'd have to pay duty on eventually.
Thanks,
Andrew

Jerseygirl

We paid the deposit to keep the mortgage to a minimum but the house was in their name...therefore when it was sold there was no tax/duty to pay. Although I didn't receive money from the sale of the bungalow I know it came under the threshold for death duty.