It’s that time of year again – and we're not talking here about Groundhog Day, Valentine's Day, ski season or Mardi Gras. Rather, we're referring to that time of the year when Americans resident overseas begin gathering together the various documents they will be needing to file their 2019 U.S. tax returns in a few months' time...
Laura Snyder, as we noted earlier this year, is the sole overseas member of a grass roots volunteer advisory organization known as the Taxpayer Advocacy Panel that works – alongside the office of the National Taxpayer Advocate – to call the IRS's attention to issues that American taxpayers are struggling with, but which the agency for various reasons may have failed to realize were problematic.
This is just to wish our readers a lovely and restful end-of-year-holiday, wherever they are in the world and however they celebrate it, and a Happy (and IRS penalty-free) New Year in 2020.
On April 1, the U.S. Government Accountability Office published a report detailing what it said was the long-overdue need for the government to take action on foreign asset reporting. The report, entitled "Foreign Asset Reporting: Actions Needed to Enhance Compliance Efforts, Eliminate Overlapping Requirements, and Mitigate Burdens on U.S. Persons Abroad” (GAO-19-180), was addressed to members of Congress.
For various reasons, people, including those with U.S. tax obligations, have long taken advantage of the option to use so-called "nominees" to hold legal title to some of their non-U.S. assets. But while there can be arguably good reasons for doing so, especially in countries where Shariah Law can dictate how assets are distributed when someone dies, it can also result in huge and unexpected problems.
Here, in an excerpt from her most recent blog, Dubai-based tax expert Virginia La Torre Jeker considers some of the issues that can arise.
Like folks everywhere, Americans are often surprised to discover how different things can be when they live abroad. Sometimes the differences are small; sometimes they're hilarious.
