Jade's recent marriage to Jack Tweedy is IHT planning straight out of the text book - had she died single with an estate of £1m, two-thirds of what her two sons inherited would have been liable to IHT at 40%.
Without knowing any of the details, I would guess that she left the amount of the nil rate band to her two sons, and the remainder in a trust with her widower as main beneficiary, which is thus exempt from IHT because of the inter-spouse exemption (which also applies to registered civil partners, and rightly so), with the trustees having the power to dribble out money to her two sons as and when, these being chargeable transfers from Mr Tweedy, but provided he lives for seven years after such transfers, there'll be no IHT.
Just sayin', is all.
Theory more or less confirmed, see update here.
Sunday, 22 March 2009
Jade Goody & Inheritance Tax planning
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4 comments:
Presumably the 'tax avoidance is the same as tax evasion' brigade will now pile in to decry this (totally legal) tax planning and demand that her entire estate pay 40% tax. Would they even allow her to use her tax free allowance, or is that considered beyond the pale as well?
Suppose instead that she'd had a sister instead of a husband, the sister having agreed to bring up the nippers. Whacko!
S, they probably will. Or maybe JG will spark a sensible debate about how evil IHT is?
D, yup, IHT is totally spiteful.
I said the same to Mrs Lola when she said, when told of the marriage 'Ah isn't that romantic?'. 'Nope, it's IHT planning' quoth I. 'You miserable git' quoth she.
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