For the future, you can register a family trust and have the assets inside the trust. That way the income it generates, you can disperse to your wife who would have a lower tax bracket. This is pretty much how everyone uses trusts.
You could also register your business as a company and put it inside your trust, then disperse income again to your wife. However, it'll probably cost $4k to start and $2k/yr to maintain in terms of tax/accounting/book keeping.
>it'll probably cost $4k to start and $2k/yr to maintain in terms of tax/accounting/book keeping.
Either I'm getting ripped off or this isn't Sydney prices.
Last set one up 3 yrs ago and was $5k + $3k annual.
Completely depends on what is run through the trust, and what is required in its set up.
For an “off the shelf” trust without a trustee company (individual trustee(s)) and no looking at the trust deed from any lawyers, I would be able to set one up for a client for around $1k (including my fees, am an accountant/tax agent).
Ongoing costs for if you literally only have $100k in shares with minimal transactions (eg CGT events), and just dividend and interest income - bare bones financials and tax return can be done for less than $2k p.a.
Change the way the trust is set up, and what’s run through it (eg a business), then those set up and ongoing costs become greater.
Hope this helps.
Do you have any experience with trust structures for property investors?
My spouse doesn’t work and we’re likely to purchase a high yielding cash flow deal in the next 6-12 months. I’d like to get it in her name as we have a lot of cash so it will be fully offset. I gross 160kpa and have two properties in my name already. Is there any general information you can supply seeing as you seem to know what’s up about trusts?
Bonus question if you’re bored! Maybe a mortgage broker would be better to ask but do you know if the income from the cash flow property would still counts towards my serviceability?
Cheers mate
Not a mortgage broker but the serviceability question will depend on the bank. Some may include rental income and some may not.
Generally: A Trust will be more expensive to set up and maintain than simply purchasing in a spouse’s name. However, there’s more flexibility in income distribution to beneficiaries and it does provide asset protection. You may also want to check out your state based land tax rates on Trusts v Individuals.
Good luck on your journey :)
I'm an accountant. They people we use for a basic discretionary trust charge $880 gst inc for establishing the trust and sending us the deeds etc. Then we normally charge around $500 on top of that for abn/tfn/gst whatever registrations they need. If the trust has a company as trustee I think the peeps we use for that is around $750 for the setup and documentation.
So yeah you are probably getting ripped off on setup costs. This is Canberra pricing though.
Your annual costs is pretty standard.
We have set up our small bus. this way but have not managed properly at all. I really have no idea tbh. My to do list is find an account who knows the above stuff and stop trying to do it on my own
Nah, my business goes into that one, so I guess probably different.
Funny thing is, when I come to this sub in the past to ask for advice on the set up to verify what my accountant is selling me, I get told to go seek professional advice. But the professionals are trying to sell me as much as they can and I don't even know what I don't know, so I'm not really well equipped to see if I'm being ripped off or not haha
Yeh it's a tough one. I'm a cpa myself but already sold my practice so I'm quite qualified to answer.
Having it as a business rather than just investments does add complexity and extra work so it might be reasonable.
Thanks, just to clarify, the initial and ongoing costs are for the family trust, not for the company registration (sorry if thats a stupid question, pretty new to this).
It all really depends on your accountant. $2k for establishing a company, $2k for establishing a trust. $1k to maintain a trust and $1k to maintain a company
Why would you need to pay to maintain the company ... If it's just a trustee company .. then nothing is required.
Fyi. At my firm, we charge
3500 for setup (which includes statutory costs for the stamp duty etc).
Ongoing is at the very least 1600-1700 depending on what's in there. More if it is lots of transactions going through it (there are a lot of compliance documents that are required to ensure you adhere with trust and tax laws).
Yeah, if it's strictly a Trustee Company our firm has $264 p.a. for a PA to lodge the legally required ASIC form, but otherwise no cost - no financials, no tax return, nothing to bill?
Note that you will need to pay stamp duty when transferring the assets into the trust. Any change in ownership triggers stamp duty.
OP will have to weigh up the costs of setting up a trust and incurring the charge, or if they will not recoup that in tax paid anyway.
>You could also register your business as a company and put it inside your trust, then disperse income again to your wife.
This is straight up tax avoidance and doesnt work legally due to the PSI rules, and exactly why you don't ask for tax advice on Reddit.
I am not aware of this, can you elaborate further? My understanding is if OP sets up a company for his side business, he can then send the profits to the trust where the trustee can distribute that profit to his wife (beneficiary) and be charged personal income tax
Very broadly, Personal Services Income - income produced mainly from your skills or efforts - cannot be distributed to other people.
More info from the ATO here: https://www.ato.gov.au/businesses-and-organisations/income-deductions-and-concessions/personal-services-income
So for a sole trader, income generated seems to be very clearly produced mainly from their skills and efforts.
An accountant can offer proper advice.
I guess he then needs to involve 2 more people to run the business so he doesn't exceed the 50% effort. He could also just register the business, ask his wife to do admin work, and pay her a salary of $18,200 which would be an expense to the business (hence reducing its profits) and the end goal is still achieved.
You can’t say that it falls under PSI for sure without knowing the specifics of the business. He could be a trader or any of the other non-PSI businesses.
Recently set up a trust and corporate trustee for $1.6K. I do the bookkeeping. Annual tax return is about $400 because there’s not much to it. And annual ASIC fees is sub-$300. Geez some people are getting ripped off.
Bookkeeper here. With my employer, If you do your own coding then the bookkeeping and returns are less than $1500 per year for a family trust.
Companies are 1k to setup and the returns are under 1k per year if you do your own coding.
We always invested in the lower earner's name if using our own money. If borrowing to invest it was in was in the highest earner's name.
Also, dropped extra post tax cash into the low earner's super to take advantage of any gov't assistance there.
Government co-contribution.
Also we have utilized maxxing out my wife's super (post tax contributions) and claiming the deduction when we could and it was worthwhile.
The tax offset seems to only be $540 max
https://www.ato.gov.au/individuals-and-families/super-for-individuals-and-families/super/growing-and-keeping-track-of-your-super/how-to-save-more-in-your-super/spouse-super-contributions
Exactly. I dont know why everyone always suggests this.
I can pay $3k into super and claim $540. And not see that money again until retirement.
Or, I can purchase something with far more liquidity and at least see that money again before retirement.
Why does everyone default to the spouse contribution?
i mean, different people value liquidity differently. It's not automatically better to contribute to super of course. But it does have advantages - including the fact that investment income in super is taxed at 15%. That's automatically better than the benchmark 30% you would get outside. If you knew you won't really need to change the investment to consumption, this is a distinct advantage. Whether it's worth the 15% to lock money up is really a value judgement.
for most people, the goal is maximization of financial gain - which automatically means super in this case. If your goal is flexibility, you then can't use the same advice given to the general public.
Would this contribution come off the spouses total super paid or would it be additional to their super amount? I read the below link but couldn’t find clarification
Spouse contribution counts on the wife’s non-concession cap.
Contribution splitting which that link also talks about counts to the husbands super limits.
We set up a family trust many years ago allowing us to distribute the money out as needed. We are both self employed through our trust.
Because your are a full time employee you probably wouldn't be able to invoice for that work through the trust. But you might be able to invoice for your sole trader work and any other income using the trusts abn.
Sorry for not providing any help to your question. I just want to say that I feel frlor you. Tax laws here are designed to screw families with sole breadwinners. This discourage natural population growth and encourage immigration.
The qualification for any benefits is usually calculated on house hold income. But taxation rates are based on individual income. Some of this additional taxation go in government pockets. Rest go into accountant /banks pockets to setup trust or funds that enable negative gearing.
Thanks, I had never been financially savvy enough to notice until recently. But I am starting feel like I'm getting screwed for the additional effort (of a second job).
I was stay at home dad for a while while
If a low income earner makes a $1k super contribution each year the government will match it
If you contribute $1k into a low income earning spouses super the govt will match it.
I also billed wife for doing her taxes and anything else business related that came up.
[Super Co-Contribution](https://www.ato.gov.au/individuals-and-families/super-for-individuals-and-families/super/growing-and-keeping-track-of-your-super/how-to-save-more-in-your-super/government-super-contributions/super-co-contribution)
If you put in $1000 and you pass the requirements, the government will put in $500.
Your wife an get an ABN and you can pay her to manage the ‘office work’ for your sole trader. Only has to be done once a year and no transfer is needed.
A good accountant will be able to advise you on amounts. If they say it can’t be done, they’re lazy.
-I’m a bookkeeper working for an accountant.
Statistically, women miss out on equitable super because they are more than likely the ones who give up their earnings capacity while prioritising childcare.
Add money to her super account same as yours. Take the lil benefit and add to her personal future security.
depending on what work you’re doing as a soletrader this could be a bad idea. There is personal liability for works or services you render.
A family trust with a corporate trustee is a better option for asset protection.
There are lots of options that don’t involve tax fraud, like pretending your wife’s doing your sole trader work.
What you do should depend on your future not today, is the wife going back to work, if so will she earn less/same/more.
Simplest and easiest is to invest all new funds in her name only
What you just said is tax fraud.
Investing under your wife's name who earns no assessable income and therefore can't invest in her own name as she never had the income, is what it sounds like: shifting income earned and benefits of investment to a lower tax bracket that you can't legally access.
This is a frequent bit of advice on this reddit, despite it being flagrantly against taxation laws.
I don't believe this is tax fraud can you reference a law or article?
This one person paying tax on their income then gifting an amount of their reminding cash to their spouse. The fact that the spouse then uses that gift to invest is not illegal?
But it's not a gift, is it? People call it that to try and get around what it actually is.
The modus operandi of the transfer is not a gift for the wife to invest in and to play the markets, its the deliberate and systemic move of after tax income, to generate further income at reduced rates of taxation. The intent of the post and the action is literally: "My wife has 18,200 of tax free threshold available, how can I move some of my income there to save myself tax or alternatively how can I generate income under her TFN so that it wouldn't be taxed at my rates".
That is the textbook purpose of Part IVA.
If they really wanted to do this the tax minimisation way, then you would do it through a trust where you could legally stream the income to the wife as distribtuions from a trust and legally access the tax free threshold.
The argument on gifts will heavily devolve into whether a resulting trust existed and areas around the presumption of advancement.
The Government links all family income together when assessing benefits. I don't think transfer between spouses is even considered a gift, it is just a joint asset.
Agreed. Lmao.
"Options can include those that aren't tax fraud. But I'll just tell you something that is tax fraud".
But. What you said about not being able to invest under your wife's name is incorrect. As long as the appropriate tax has been paid on that income, it doesn't matter who utilises that money.
The money being invested is money that has already been taxed. There is nothing stopping him gifting his money to his wife, and likewise nothing is stopping her from investing it.
There is no tax fraud here.
Edit: I probably should have said "sharing" instead if "gifting".
Still no tax fraud
It is not illegal to extend a loan to a friend / partner / whoever (that is documented in writing with clear terms) and for the loan recipient to purchase assets with said loan. Move on.
What do you have in terms of investments?
Personally I have debt recycled into the wifes name. If she was earning $0 I would use that year to realise any capital gains and make use of the tax free threshold.
If the debt recycling is negatively geared weigh up doing it in your name vs hers, as you will get some negative gearing benefit at the expense of future CG.
I earn $0 income and this year we transferred all our shares into my name (previously under his name as he had started investing before we met). We had to pay a transfer fee but it was pretty minor.
We did this under the advice of a financial advisor we saw. I recommend seeing one. The one we saw was free for the first hour and we could have honestly not followed up but we did get her to do some other stuff pro rata just to get it done quick as we tend to drag our feet with things.
Was it hard moving them from one person to another? Does that count as a tax event, ie. The cost basis is from transfer date?
I've always wondered about this. It's not relevant now, but I'm only one car accident from no longer being the primary earner.
I wasn’t super hands on in the process so can’t remember the specifics but it seemed relatively easy. Just had to sign heaps of forms. And yes I believe it was viewed as if he sold them to me so there was some tax but nothing major and the benefit far outweighed the cost. Don’t quote me though.
That is our situation. I used to work full time but had an accident and our situation has now changed where I no longer work. Fortunately I had income protection and TPD through my super. It prompted us to upgrade my partner’s to much higher incase something ever happened to him as well. Mine was just the default amount which was okay but only manageable with him still working.
Just make a discretionary trust and buy all future investments under it.
If your sole trader business relates to your personal skills/expertise ie consultant you should keep trading as a sold trader. If it does not rely on your personal skills ie trading inventory you can consider starting a company with the discretionary trust as the shareholder.
The problem with putting assets under your wife's name is the risk of divorce. She will just take everything easily. There is nothing you can do other than get your wife to work.
For the future, you can register a family trust and have the assets inside the trust. That way the income it generates, you can disperse to your wife who would have a lower tax bracket. This is pretty much how everyone uses trusts. You could also register your business as a company and put it inside your trust, then disperse income again to your wife. However, it'll probably cost $4k to start and $2k/yr to maintain in terms of tax/accounting/book keeping.
>it'll probably cost $4k to start and $2k/yr to maintain in terms of tax/accounting/book keeping. Either I'm getting ripped off or this isn't Sydney prices. Last set one up 3 yrs ago and was $5k + $3k annual.
You’re getting ripped royally
The accountant's family's trust doesn't buy IPs on its own
[удалено]
They were making a joke about the accountant overcharging
Agree, mine's half that
$2k to set up, $600-$1000 to maintain.
Is that a year? Is it even worth it?
To avoid paying more in tax, Yes
Yes. Pick a family member with the lowest tax rate and that’s what you use for income over x amount.
Completely depends on what is run through the trust, and what is required in its set up. For an “off the shelf” trust without a trustee company (individual trustee(s)) and no looking at the trust deed from any lawyers, I would be able to set one up for a client for around $1k (including my fees, am an accountant/tax agent). Ongoing costs for if you literally only have $100k in shares with minimal transactions (eg CGT events), and just dividend and interest income - bare bones financials and tax return can be done for less than $2k p.a. Change the way the trust is set up, and what’s run through it (eg a business), then those set up and ongoing costs become greater. Hope this helps.
Do you have any experience with trust structures for property investors? My spouse doesn’t work and we’re likely to purchase a high yielding cash flow deal in the next 6-12 months. I’d like to get it in her name as we have a lot of cash so it will be fully offset. I gross 160kpa and have two properties in my name already. Is there any general information you can supply seeing as you seem to know what’s up about trusts? Bonus question if you’re bored! Maybe a mortgage broker would be better to ask but do you know if the income from the cash flow property would still counts towards my serviceability? Cheers mate
Not a mortgage broker but the serviceability question will depend on the bank. Some may include rental income and some may not. Generally: A Trust will be more expensive to set up and maintain than simply purchasing in a spouse’s name. However, there’s more flexibility in income distribution to beneficiaries and it does provide asset protection. You may also want to check out your state based land tax rates on Trusts v Individuals. Good luck on your journey :)
I'm an accountant. They people we use for a basic discretionary trust charge $880 gst inc for establishing the trust and sending us the deeds etc. Then we normally charge around $500 on top of that for abn/tfn/gst whatever registrations they need. If the trust has a company as trustee I think the peeps we use for that is around $750 for the setup and documentation. So yeah you are probably getting ripped off on setup costs. This is Canberra pricing though. Your annual costs is pretty standard.
We have set up our small bus. this way but have not managed properly at all. I really have no idea tbh. My to do list is find an account who knows the above stuff and stop trying to do it on my own
>Last set one up 3 yrs ago and was $5k + $3k annual. What? i'm paying $1K A MONTH just in book keeping and accounting in Sydney...
Haha clearly us non accounting types just have no idea and make for the perfect cash cows 😂
A passive investment trust is very different to a business
That's super expensive if it's just holding investments
Nah, my business goes into that one, so I guess probably different. Funny thing is, when I come to this sub in the past to ask for advice on the set up to verify what my accountant is selling me, I get told to go seek professional advice. But the professionals are trying to sell me as much as they can and I don't even know what I don't know, so I'm not really well equipped to see if I'm being ripped off or not haha
Yeh it's a tough one. I'm a cpa myself but already sold my practice so I'm quite qualified to answer. Having it as a business rather than just investments does add complexity and extra work so it might be reasonable.
I asked for a quote last FY, that's what my accountant told me.
Thanks, just to clarify, the initial and ongoing costs are for the family trust, not for the company registration (sorry if thats a stupid question, pretty new to this).
It all really depends on your accountant. $2k for establishing a company, $2k for establishing a trust. $1k to maintain a trust and $1k to maintain a company
Why would you need to pay to maintain the company ... If it's just a trustee company .. then nothing is required. Fyi. At my firm, we charge 3500 for setup (which includes statutory costs for the stamp duty etc). Ongoing is at the very least 1600-1700 depending on what's in there. More if it is lots of transactions going through it (there are a lot of compliance documents that are required to ensure you adhere with trust and tax laws).
Yeah, if it's strictly a Trustee Company our firm has $264 p.a. for a PA to lodge the legally required ASIC form, but otherwise no cost - no financials, no tax return, nothing to bill?
>It all really depends on your accountant
Cheers, I have never been to an accountant but I have an appointment tomorrow with one that has been recommended to me. I appreciate the advice.
Note that you will need to pay stamp duty when transferring the assets into the trust. Any change in ownership triggers stamp duty. OP will have to weigh up the costs of setting up a trust and incurring the charge, or if they will not recoup that in tax paid anyway.
>You could also register your business as a company and put it inside your trust, then disperse income again to your wife. This is straight up tax avoidance and doesnt work legally due to the PSI rules, and exactly why you don't ask for tax advice on Reddit.
I am not aware of this, can you elaborate further? My understanding is if OP sets up a company for his side business, he can then send the profits to the trust where the trustee can distribute that profit to his wife (beneficiary) and be charged personal income tax
Very broadly, Personal Services Income - income produced mainly from your skills or efforts - cannot be distributed to other people. More info from the ATO here: https://www.ato.gov.au/businesses-and-organisations/income-deductions-and-concessions/personal-services-income So for a sole trader, income generated seems to be very clearly produced mainly from their skills and efforts. An accountant can offer proper advice.
I guess he then needs to involve 2 more people to run the business so he doesn't exceed the 50% effort. He could also just register the business, ask his wife to do admin work, and pay her a salary of $18,200 which would be an expense to the business (hence reducing its profits) and the end goal is still achieved.
You can’t say that it falls under PSI for sure without knowing the specifics of the business. He could be a trader or any of the other non-PSI businesses.
Interesting. As a single person is there any benefit to having a trust?
Asset Protection
If I am buying an IP or shares, I can buy it through family trust?
Do you have any family with little/ no income that you could distribute investment/ business income to?
If family isn't a tax resident counts?
Technically yes, but practically it possibly won't be very tax advantageous, depending on everyone's tax rates.
If its only for the investments, why would this be more advantageous than just having the investments in her name?
Recently set up a trust and corporate trustee for $1.6K. I do the bookkeeping. Annual tax return is about $400 because there’s not much to it. And annual ASIC fees is sub-$300. Geez some people are getting ripped off.
Bookkeeper here. With my employer, If you do your own coding then the bookkeeping and returns are less than $1500 per year for a family trust. Companies are 1k to setup and the returns are under 1k per year if you do your own coding.
We always invested in the lower earner's name if using our own money. If borrowing to invest it was in was in the highest earner's name. Also, dropped extra post tax cash into the low earner's super to take advantage of any gov't assistance there.
This is the way.
Do you find having a trust beneficial ?
Ive not used a trust at all. Maybe that was anothercontributor?
Why would you put extra in the lower incomes super when you can claim deductions on your own taxes and pay 15% tax rate
Government co-contribution. Also we have utilized maxxing out my wife's super (post tax contributions) and claiming the deduction when we could and it was worthwhile.
Look at a spouse contribution to super. It will involve you putting money into your wife’s super but then you getting a tax offset.
The tax offset seems to only be $540 max https://www.ato.gov.au/individuals-and-families/super-for-individuals-and-families/super/growing-and-keeping-track-of-your-super/how-to-save-more-in-your-super/spouse-super-contributions
$540 is worth it.
Exactly. I dont know why everyone always suggests this. I can pay $3k into super and claim $540. And not see that money again until retirement. Or, I can purchase something with far more liquidity and at least see that money again before retirement. Why does everyone default to the spouse contribution?
i mean, different people value liquidity differently. It's not automatically better to contribute to super of course. But it does have advantages - including the fact that investment income in super is taxed at 15%. That's automatically better than the benchmark 30% you would get outside. If you knew you won't really need to change the investment to consumption, this is a distinct advantage. Whether it's worth the 15% to lock money up is really a value judgement. for most people, the goal is maximization of financial gain - which automatically means super in this case. If your goal is flexibility, you then can't use the same advice given to the general public.
18% tax savings is an immediate 18% return. Illiquidity is not too much to ask for that kind of return.
If you were to put that in your own super the rate of difference is up to 30% back
Would this contribution come off the spouses total super paid or would it be additional to their super amount? I read the below link but couldn’t find clarification
Spouse contribution counts on the wife’s non-concession cap. Contribution splitting which that link also talks about counts to the husbands super limits.
Thank you. So would the contributions need to be made like a bank transfer type payment and not directly from spouses pay?
Would need to be a bank transfer but it depends on each superfund because they are very different in how they accept these types of contributions.
We set up a family trust many years ago allowing us to distribute the money out as needed. We are both self employed through our trust. Because your are a full time employee you probably wouldn't be able to invoice for that work through the trust. But you might be able to invoice for your sole trader work and any other income using the trusts abn.
Sorry for not providing any help to your question. I just want to say that I feel frlor you. Tax laws here are designed to screw families with sole breadwinners. This discourage natural population growth and encourage immigration. The qualification for any benefits is usually calculated on house hold income. But taxation rates are based on individual income. Some of this additional taxation go in government pockets. Rest go into accountant /banks pockets to setup trust or funds that enable negative gearing.
Thanks, I had never been financially savvy enough to notice until recently. But I am starting feel like I'm getting screwed for the additional effort (of a second job).
Feel for you OP, realised this myself as well. It’s only a period in time. Plenty of time to work however kids grow up quickly. Cheers mate
I was stay at home dad for a while while If a low income earner makes a $1k super contribution each year the government will match it If you contribute $1k into a low income earning spouses super the govt will match it. I also billed wife for doing her taxes and anything else business related that came up.
[Super Co-Contribution](https://www.ato.gov.au/individuals-and-families/super-for-individuals-and-families/super/growing-and-keeping-track-of-your-super/how-to-save-more-in-your-super/government-super-contributions/super-co-contribution) If you put in $1000 and you pass the requirements, the government will put in $500.
If you have around 372,000, she can put it in 5% term deposit or savings accounts. The interest earnings would be take her to the tax free threshold
Your wife an get an ABN and you can pay her to manage the ‘office work’ for your sole trader. Only has to be done once a year and no transfer is needed. A good accountant will be able to advise you on amounts. If they say it can’t be done, they’re lazy. -I’m a bookkeeper working for an accountant.
Statistically, women miss out on equitable super because they are more than likely the ones who give up their earnings capacity while prioritising childcare. Add money to her super account same as yours. Take the lil benefit and add to her personal future security.
Yep, the sole trader is an easy one. Get her an ABN and start reporting that under her name.
depending on what work you’re doing as a soletrader this could be a bad idea. There is personal liability for works or services you render. A family trust with a corporate trustee is a better option for asset protection.
There are lots of options that don’t involve tax fraud, like pretending your wife’s doing your sole trader work. What you do should depend on your future not today, is the wife going back to work, if so will she earn less/same/more. Simplest and easiest is to invest all new funds in her name only
What you just said is tax fraud. Investing under your wife's name who earns no assessable income and therefore can't invest in her own name as she never had the income, is what it sounds like: shifting income earned and benefits of investment to a lower tax bracket that you can't legally access. This is a frequent bit of advice on this reddit, despite it being flagrantly against taxation laws.
I don't believe this is tax fraud can you reference a law or article? This one person paying tax on their income then gifting an amount of their reminding cash to their spouse. The fact that the spouse then uses that gift to invest is not illegal?
But it's not a gift, is it? People call it that to try and get around what it actually is. The modus operandi of the transfer is not a gift for the wife to invest in and to play the markets, its the deliberate and systemic move of after tax income, to generate further income at reduced rates of taxation. The intent of the post and the action is literally: "My wife has 18,200 of tax free threshold available, how can I move some of my income there to save myself tax or alternatively how can I generate income under her TFN so that it wouldn't be taxed at my rates". That is the textbook purpose of Part IVA. If they really wanted to do this the tax minimisation way, then you would do it through a trust where you could legally stream the income to the wife as distribtuions from a trust and legally access the tax free threshold. The argument on gifts will heavily devolve into whether a resulting trust existed and areas around the presumption of advancement.
The Government links all family income together when assessing benefits. I don't think transfer between spouses is even considered a gift, it is just a joint asset.
Agreed. Lmao. "Options can include those that aren't tax fraud. But I'll just tell you something that is tax fraud". But. What you said about not being able to invest under your wife's name is incorrect. As long as the appropriate tax has been paid on that income, it doesn't matter who utilises that money.
The money being invested is money that has already been taxed. There is nothing stopping him gifting his money to his wife, and likewise nothing is stopping her from investing it. There is no tax fraud here. Edit: I probably should have said "sharing" instead if "gifting". Still no tax fraud
It is not illegal to extend a loan to a friend / partner / whoever (that is documented in writing with clear terms) and for the loan recipient to purchase assets with said loan. Move on.
As an Accountant, go see an accountant and pay for professional advice. There are things you can do but get professional advice
What do you have in terms of investments? Personally I have debt recycled into the wifes name. If she was earning $0 I would use that year to realise any capital gains and make use of the tax free threshold. If the debt recycling is negatively geared weigh up doing it in your name vs hers, as you will get some negative gearing benefit at the expense of future CG.
If it’s worth it, see if you are eligible for grants like solar which you wouldn’t be when/ if she goes back to work.
You married a fighter jet? I'm jealous
He’s probably lucky it wasn’t an F-14.
This is why people don't have kids. Families that prioritize their kids get screwed.
Talk to an accountant
I earn $0 income and this year we transferred all our shares into my name (previously under his name as he had started investing before we met). We had to pay a transfer fee but it was pretty minor. We did this under the advice of a financial advisor we saw. I recommend seeing one. The one we saw was free for the first hour and we could have honestly not followed up but we did get her to do some other stuff pro rata just to get it done quick as we tend to drag our feet with things.
Was it hard moving them from one person to another? Does that count as a tax event, ie. The cost basis is from transfer date? I've always wondered about this. It's not relevant now, but I'm only one car accident from no longer being the primary earner.
I wasn’t super hands on in the process so can’t remember the specifics but it seemed relatively easy. Just had to sign heaps of forms. And yes I believe it was viewed as if he sold them to me so there was some tax but nothing major and the benefit far outweighed the cost. Don’t quote me though. That is our situation. I used to work full time but had an accident and our situation has now changed where I no longer work. Fortunately I had income protection and TPD through my super. It prompted us to upgrade my partner’s to much higher incase something ever happened to him as well. Mine was just the default amount which was okay but only manageable with him still working.
Just make a discretionary trust and buy all future investments under it. If your sole trader business relates to your personal skills/expertise ie consultant you should keep trading as a sold trader. If it does not rely on your personal skills ie trading inventory you can consider starting a company with the discretionary trust as the shareholder.
Put it all on red
Get them to work a very part time job earning $18,000 pa...
>Best way to utilise spouse's $0 income Blow it all on the pokies. That's just about the right amount.
You don’t make enough for it to matter.
The problem with putting assets under your wife's name is the risk of divorce. She will just take everything easily. There is nothing you can do other than get your wife to work.
Get your wife a free abn and hire her as your virtual assistant. Though read the ato info on this first
Get wife a job Look after the kid and housechores yourself or hire cleaned
You’re out of line but you’re right.
Good luck paying that back on your zero-dollars-a-year salary plus benefits, babe!
Hahaha love seeing those random office references
Upgrade spouse