hi

The FHOG is regulated by the states – usually the Office fo state Revenue.

There is actually no min period to live in a house to make it your main residence, you just need to prove it if audited. The best way to do this is to prove as much evidence as you can with changing your address on rates, drivers licence, phone, electriicity, electoral roll etc.

Not really able to acheive both.

you could buy it via a trust structure, but to claim any gearing benefits in your personal name you would need to buy units (and borrow to buy them). The units are assets and would be up for grabs by creditors.

Another option is to buy in a discretionary trust which is the best vehicle for asset protection and to just where the income losses and try to offset these by having other income diverted into the trust – eg business income.

You really need good advice before you do all of this as if it is not set up properly you could still get caught if you were to go down. eg. deposit provided to the trust could be clawed back. Doing things to defeat creditors and hide money etc could also be illegal.

Yes I agree. $2000 isn't too bad and there are many things to consider such as various roles and their role players.

You can save some money by setting up the company yourself. Just walk into asic and fill in some forms. $400 I think is the fee. Or you could pay $99 on law central and get all the forms filled in and a constitution as well (these are no longer compulsory as there are rules in the corporations act which can be relied up for companies without constitutions). I would get 100 shares too rather than just 1 share as you may want to add shareholders later.

1 director is good for asset protection reasons and borrowing reasons – lenders want guarantees from directors.

Besides the legal and accounting issues there is also the borrowing issues to consider. eg. Some lenders will want guarantees from all adult named beneficiaries (which is ridiculous!). So if you name your girlfriend then she may need to give a guarantee, This can limit borrowing power dramatically. Also the new anit money laundering legislation requires indentifying all major beneficiaries.

You may get things wrong if you go alone with the trust – eg if you put a relative as appointor you could get into trouble as the appointor can never benefit from the trust.

This is very complex. You will be earning an income in Australia from the rent, although you may have deductions to offset this, so you will need to lodge a tax return. You will also need to declare you overeas income. Whether you are tax more will depend on if there is a double tax agreement with the country you are working in.

Whether you are a on resident for tax purposes depends on a number of factors including where you permanent home is, how long you will be overseas etc etc. Non residents don't receive the tax free thresholds and pay 30% tax from $1 in income.

And did you know that you can rent out your main residence for up to 6 years, claim all costs and still sell it CGT free – $25,000 pa x 6 is a big loss of potential income!

Hi Juder

I don't think you have much to worry about. It was only an investment for 2 months, so the CGT would only apply to the growth during this period – if any.

you probably have a good case for moving in as soon as practical too.

Best to check with your accountant.

Rudi

If you are thinking of buying in Thailand, I beleive the Bangkok bank, Singapore branch used to lend to non-residents, but they have recently stopped doing so.

Another option is to buy something with Vendor finance. This is where the owner will let you pay them off in installments. I have seen a few ads for these deals in Thailand.

A LOC will only work on Australian property with equity available.

hi Neel

I don't think having a corporate trustee will change anything. Trusts can't negative gear, so you will need to work around things a bit. You can still borrow to buy units and then do it this way, but the unit holders must get all the capital gains too. you can't do the old income units/capital growth units anymore or the ATO will disallow the deductions.

you may also find it hard to find a lender willing to lend if you have a company as trustee is the loan needs to be in the unit holder's names. This is because the legal owner will be different to the borrowers.

or, in the unlikely event that you can get the owner of the land to agree to go on the loan……

Hi Anthony

You should seek legal advice because there are various laws relating to raising money from the public. ASIC are actively looking at this because of the number of failed developments recently.

The main thing is to never pay off an investment loan until you have your PPOR loan fully paid off – and even then it is probably still a good idea to pay IO.

Once you pay money into a loan it is trapped. Say you paid the loan down to zero, then you wanted to buy a new PPOR – you would have to borrow the lot and the interest would not be deductible.

Instead of paying the IP loan down why not pay the money in a 100% offset account, This will save you the same interest and make your money available without reducing loans. Will save you a heap of tax later.