IHT - part of the problem. What about carousel fraud?

chapmag

Tiggs wrote:

your situation doesnt really sound like it needs an IHT consulatnt.

Tiggs,

Are you saying that an IHT consultant is different to an IFA.

If so, how do I identify one in my area.

In addition, are you saying see an IHT Consultant to set up the "Tennants in Common" documentation and a solicitor to get the wills drawn up?

Thanks in anticipation.

LizEstelle

Tiggs wrote:

your argument is the same as speed camera campaigners who say "dont catch speeders...catch robbers, their worse"

What is your back ground to know that the tax has been impossible to collect from the very rich? The idea that someone with a few million can use laws and loopholes not avalible to everyone is nonsense in the most part.

The reason the rich pay less than they may otherwise do is because they are clever enough to plan for it - thats not to say they pay no tax, they pay far more than everyone else, despite their planning.

IHT is a tax that the wealthy plan for and minimise and the less wealthly moan about and pay because they prefer moaning to planning it seems.

100% spot on.

In Herit Aunts Tacks is one of the few genuinely voluntary taxes, as Roy Jenkins once said. It is quite untrue to say that you cannot either avoid or minimise its impact. The mechanisms for doing this are open to everyone and can range from simply making the right kind of will to setting up certain types of insurances/savings plans which any financial institution worth its salt will do for you.

No need for any large scale use of accountants/solicitors.

Need for:

1. Elementary use of braincells.
2. Getting off backside.

Nobody ever said any kind of tax was fair. It's just NECESSARY if you want that stupid thing, national infrastructure. Unlike most, however, I for one believe that IHT IS a fair tax inasmuch as it is levied on unearned income and obliges each generation to actually think about the debt (literally) which it owes to its country and its parents.

Even with IHT in place, I have seen too many people living in relative comfort from money which they've simply inherited and done nothing to actually deserve while hardworking neighbours (who hadn't chosen their parents with enough care) struggle to make ends meet.

People can avoid it if they want. The whingeing about only being able to inherit £285,000 before paying a percentage towards the national upkeep we can do without.

Tiggs_2

nemo183 wrote:

If you find yourself at the bottom of the economic heap, with no realistic chance, for whatever reason, of climbing upwards, then if you buy a ticket you stand a chance, no matter how tiny, of turning your life around.

if the chance of your life getting better is 14 million to 1.........God help you!

Tiggs_2

chapmag wrote:

Tiggs,

Are you saying that an IHT consultant is different to an IFA.

If so, how do I identify one in my area.

In addition, are you saying see an IHT Consultant to set up the "Tennants in Common" documentation and a solicitor to get the wills drawn up?

Thanks in anticipation.

An IHT consultant is someone that can advise you on IHT! They may be an IFA, they may be tied to a firm...they may work for a bank.

In reality most FA dont market themselves in that way because IHT is only a small part of their business - i market myself in that way because IHT is 100% of my business.

Its nothing more than a term i have chosen to use to describe myself in a way that seperates me from the "jack of all trades" normal adviser.

Finding any FA that knows their IHT is easy enough - call some up and ask them if its their field. The slight issue at present is that too many "normal" FA's label themsleves as being expert in the feild simply because its a market with a lot of profit in it. So ask your adviser what his experience is in that area...what exams does he hold in that feild.

As for TIC and Wills - many advsiers will pass you onto a solicitor for that - at which stage i would question thier "IHT adviser" status. At my firm we can arange all of that for clients and would regard it as the first port of call in 99% of IHT planning cases.

Mrs_pbradley936

I cannot be the only person who has a husband totally uninterested in Inheritance Tax planning. His idea is that nobody ever left him a thing and intends to spend his own money on whatever he wants (which does not include taking out any sort of policy or paying any one fees). Our kids can have whatever we leave behind. I would like to do some sort of planning is it worthwhile if hubby refuses to consider it?

margaretclare

pbradley936 wrote:

I cannot be the only person who has a husband totally uninterested in Inheritance Tax planning. His idea is that nobody ever left him a thing and intends to spend his own money on whatever he wants (which does not include taking out any sort of policy or paying any one fees). Our kids can have whatever we leave behind. I would like to do some sort of planning is it worthwhile if hubby refuses to consider it?

I must admit that DH and I have a similar sort of attitude to your husband.

I suppose it all depends on what your total assets are, if your husband thinks he can spend all his own money within his own lifetime. I am in full agreement with the basic idea behind that. I've heard of people who wouldn't downsize etc because 'it's the children's inheritance'. No one has a God-given right to an inheritance!

As your husband says, no one ever gave us a darned thing. Except that, in my case, it wasn't a case of being left things after someone had died, but being helped while they were alive. This is what I have been doing recently in the case of my homeless jobless granddaughter, and I even got the 'no one ever gave us a thing' argument then.

Your husband has a perfect right to do what he likes with his own money. And the same applies to you - you have every right to do what you like with what is yours. However, if it's assets you have between you then some joint planning and decision-making is necessary.

I hope that you have all your own savings in separate savings accounts and not in a joint account?

HTH

Margaret

chapmag

Tiggs wrote:

As for TIC and Wills - many advsiers will pass you onto a solicitor for that - at which stage i would question thier "IHT adviser" status. At my firm we can arange all of that for clients and would regard it as the first port of call in 99% of IHT planning cases.

Thanks for that Tigg.

My IHT planning is pretty straight forward.

Myself and my wife with 1 house (about to go TIC)

Two grown up children.

First to die leaves their half of the house in trust for children (more to guard against preditor partners than anything else).

Off to the Solicitor to write mirror wills.

Thanks for your input!

Tiggs_2

pbradley936 wrote:

I cannot be the only person who has a husband totally uninterested in Inheritance Tax planning. His idea is that nobody ever left him a thing and intends to spend his own money on whatever he wants (which does not include taking out any sort of policy or paying any one fees). Our kids can have whatever we leave behind. I would like to do some sort of planning is it worthwhile if hubby refuses to consider it?

while your husband is free to do what he wants his notion of "spend it before he dies" is nonsense unless he knows when he'll be dead.

and the issue of "no one ever gave us anything" is equally poor - for one thing if the option is the goverment or your kids...who would not choose kids? and most IHT is coming around because of house prices - if you have gained from that and then do sod all to pass on the benifits to your kids will they be able to pay off their mortgage?

in my case my house will be paid off when my parents are dead - simple as that.

margaretclare

Tiggs wrote:

...and the issue of "no one ever gave us anything" is equally poor - for one thing if the option is the goverment or your kids...who would not choose kids? and most IHT is coming around because of house prices - if you have gained from that and then do sod all to pass on the benefits to your kids will they be able to pay off their mortgage?

in my case my house will be paid off when my parents are dead - simple as that.

OK, just acting as devil's advocate here, you understand.

No one ever gave me an inheritance in order to pay off my mortgage! If we hadn't done equity release 3 years ago we would still have been paying a mortgage until we're 83, that's 12 years from now.

OK, you may say, we have 'benefited' from rising house prices otherwise we wouldn't have been able to release that equity, but it's a circular argument, because if house prices hadn't risen then we would still have been paying £260 a month until we're 83. Even if/when one of us is left on his/her own, the survivor would - if he/she wished to remain here - be paying the £260 a month out of one person's income, as opposed to the 2 people's income we have now.

In addition, there is only one person in our families - his and mine - who needs/deserves that kind of help, and that's my homeless granddaughter. The rest of them are all doing very very nicely thank you, and do not need a thing from us.

We did our part in giving them a good upbringing, the best education we could arrange for them to have, all the support and help while they were getting established, and now, whatever we have is ours to ensure a comfortable life for whatever time we have left.

You do sometimes hear of younger people helping parents/grandparents who aren't as well-off as we are - it isn't necessarily a one-way street!

Margaret

Tiggs_2

thats all fine.....the attitude i have issue with is the one where people COULD take action but cant be bothered and justify their inability to act on a "i never got a hand out" approach.