Selling a UK property - tax question

LMWCOZ

Hi there

I'm wondering here if anyone here can help. My husband and I live in Australia but he has a flat in London. We want to sell the UK flat and buy something here instead. We currently own (well, the bank does) a house in Australia.
Anyway my husband is a permanent resident for Australia, and is a Non-Resident Landlord for tax purposes in the UK. We always do a UK tax return as well as an Australian one.
When we sell the flat does he need to pay capital gains in the UK bearing in mind that he will be paying capital gains in Australia as well. And how does he opt out of doing a tax return in future once it is sold and we have no ties to the UK, as after we sell it that will be our final tax return - we don't want to get fines for not submitting a tax return in future when we don't actually need to.

We have tried contacting HMRC but not had any luck, they don't seem to understand what we're asking. We're happy to pay whatever tax we need to pay, we just don't want to have to pay it twice when legally I think we only need to pay it to one country or another.

HappyMJ

There are double taxation agreements in place between UK and Australia so you'd pay the capital gains tax in UK and nothing in Australia as you've already paid tax on it in the UK.

You don't get fines for not completing tax returns when they aren't required. They might send you a penalty but you just send a letter back saying there's no income and they'll cancel the penalty....but do try and tell them in advance to avoid all that hassle.

The bank doesn't own your house...you do. You are paying the bank for finance. They just have a charge over your house in case you fail to pay. You can sell it without asking the bank and do whatever you want with it but the sale won't proceed any further unless the mortgage is paid off with the proceeds which your solicitor will sort out.

booksurr

given he is non resident and the property has not yet been sold I suggest he reads the HMRC guide as the rules changed significantly wef April 2015
https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/413988/capital-gains-tax-non-uk-res.pdf

his gain is now "rebased" from April 2015 and he will be taxed on the gain since then. Any gain prior to that date is still free of tax as it always was for non residents

the further good news is nothing has changed in terms of double taxation. He will not be taxed twice, but should familiarise himself with the UK/ Australia tax treaty to make sure he understands what is covered
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/australia-tax-treaties-in-force