Advice on receiving a gift from non UK resident relative

AnonUser54321

I am in the incredibly lucky position that a relative wants to gift me some money in order to buy some land (approx £40k), but don't know who to get advice from as its a bit tricky. My relative is a UK citizen but is resident in Ireland. They don't own any property in the UK (neither do I!), however do have pockets of property scattered around Europe - I'm not sure if their total estate would be worth much over £300k. Their worry is that if they were to die in the next 7 years (not impossible, although hopefully unlikely) I would then be hit with a tax bill, although I'm not sure how this would work if they're not a UK resident. The money is however held in a UK bank account.

Who would I speak to that might have a good knowledge of dealing with this sort of thing please? I've never ever had any dealings with buying any sort of property and I've never received any sort of gift from anyone so my knowledge is very limited!

Grumpy_chap

There is no UK tax on gifts at the time of giving, either the donor or the recipient.

IHT is unlikely to become a concern for an estate valued at £300k, unless the value increases before death.
DoA may be a consideration if the donor requires care in their later years.

£300k total estate value needs to include the "pockets of property scattered around Europe"

You will need to demonstrate source of the funds when buying a property and be able to evidence that it truly is a gift, particularly if needing a mortgage as well.  AML/KYC may require that source of funds is confirmed at time of receiving the funds.

Jeremy535897

Your relative needs to look into Irish capital acquisitions tax. It can catch non-Irish citizens. See:
https://globalwealth.ie/in-the-media/beware-the-cat

NorthYorkie

What is the motive behind this? Is this really a gift of cash from your relative that you have decided to use to purchase land in the UK? Or are you merely acting as your relative's trustee/nominee for the purchase? In other words who is really going to own the land - who will be entitled to any income from it and who will be entitled to the proceeds of any sale?

Forgive my suspicious nature but the Revenue are naturally sceptical about large amount which are claimed to be gifts from non-UK resident individuals, so make sure the transactions are documented so that, if the question arises sometime in the future, you can prove the source of the funds.

AnonUser54321

Hi, apologies I've only just caught up with this. The funds come from inheritance he received when my grandfather passed away a few years ago, it's sat in a UK account untouched since so I imagine would be easy to verify where its come from. I wouldn't be acting as an agent/nominee, he is very keen that it is all above board and in my name, I wouldn't be going for it if I thought it was not above board. His total estate would include the bits of land elsewhere, none of it is worth much (few scrubby acres on the side of a Spanish mountain anyone?)

Thanks for the tip re. the Irish capital acquisitions tax I'll check that out!