Non resident tax - Page 4

Hi John, it is shocking that nobody, especially a solicitor, made you aware of the community charges. Yes we have a responsibility to seek out information ourselves just as I have done with this post re NR Tax BUT you could reasonably expect that a professional you are paying fees to would tell you everything you need to be aware of! I am learning new things all the time and from your post when the time comes I will be using only professionals who come recommended and will double check things such as community charges. Thank you

Hi,

I think it’s inheritance tax your referring to.

We had brought our property from a couple where one had died. The lady who then went on to sell it to us didn’t pay any inheritance tax as she inherited obviously only halve the property value, she already owned the other half. The money involved was below a threshold which I believe was around 100000 euro or percent of. 

It’s obviously worth having valid wills in place etc

Hope this helps

Regards

Terry

Since we bought our house back in 2001/2002 we have retained the use of our solicitor who in turn sorts out our tax and we can contact them anytime we need advice/ help. I think we pay in or around €100 per annum. We are very fortunate that there is a wonderful Scottish lady solicitor in the practice who we generally deal with. 

Terry,  We are non residents and so if one or other of us dues, we must pay inheritance tax.  Different if you are a resident. Totally different rules. The lady you bought from May have been a resident. Please ask your solicitor for clarification.

We have made Spanish wills and I would be surprised if most others haven’t. We made our wills when we purchased our house. 

Rose,

I don’t think she was a resident as she lived in the uk and according to neighbours hardly used the place, but did own it for 17 years. I will check this as it appeared on our paperwork via our purchase 

Terry

Hi Terry, Yes it is the inheritance tax I was referring to (subject came up when I asked original question about non resident tax). It is bizarre that if you joint own a property with your spouse that you are liable to pay tax on the death of one. However, if we're talking that figure as a threshold we will be ok, we're not made of money 😁 Thanks for your reply.

Denise

Hi,

I believe that was the figure ,around €100000 .

Also I recall it needs to be settled inside 6 months or you will incur the wrath of the Spanish taxman. I will try and check the exact figures, we were ourselves were interested in this for obvious reasons, but beware if you haven’t got a Spanish will. 
terry

I remember reading on the old Torrevieja forum where a woman posted a very distressing post. As I recall , this lady snd her husband were joint owners of a house. Sadly, the husband died and she was left to find about €6000 which she  didn’t  have. That woman tried to sell her little house and as it was about 15 years ago when the recession hit and properties dropped in value, nobody wanted to buy it. I remember that she was distraught and didn’t know where to turn to. I never forgot as it really saddened me to think that the poor soul had lost her husband and now she’s was faced with losing her home or worse, faced with huge debts and no way to pay them. 

Interestingly, a couple of years later , a German lady who lived across the road from us and could speak fluent English and Spanish told me that when her husband died a few years before, she refused to pay the inheritance tax, absolutely refused as she said that living in the EU, she should not have to pay it. I don’t believe she ever did pay. Haven’t seen her in the past few years. Neighbours said she was living in Tenerife with her daughter although her beautiful place is still waiting for her to return.( old age) 

I doubt if any of us  I.e non residents actually know roughly how much one or other of us will have to pay should our other half die. It’s time to make enquiries and find out before we find ourselves having to hand over some of our life savings to appease the Spanish Tax man.  They don’t ever mention this in A PLACE IN THE SUN. 

Very interesting information. And I agree with you regarding A Place in the Sun and other similar programmes. They should provide important legal information to factor in to any purchase.  I am so thankful for these forums, everyone is so helpful.

Hi rose,

Just done a bit of research on the inheritance.

We will assume there’s a will in place.

In the Valencian region you can inherit up to €100,000 without having to pay inheritance tax as long as your the husband or wife, it differs with other relatives on a sliding scale.

There is no difference between non resident and resident, spain was told to stop doing that a while back by the EU.

Last thing to mention is you have to self declare and as I suspected within 6 months or a 5% fine is imposed . Inheritance includes anything of value ie cars ,campers caravans etc.

As previously stated if you inherit half a property,it’s half the properties value what counts and not the total value..

This like most things in spain depends on what region your in....

Terry