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By David deForrest
General Manager
real estate miami beach, miami beach real estate, realtor miami beach, miami beach realty, miami beach investment, miami beach propertydf.jpg (8763 bytes)

The settlement agent handling my purchase wants me to execute a "FIRPTA" affidavit. What is this about?

FIRPTA is short for "Foreign Investment in Real Property Tax Act" (26 U.S.C. § 1445) the purpose of which is to collect taxes due on sale of real estate owned by foreign individuals or entities which do not pay US taxes. Since in cases where the Seller is not a US Resident or Corporation, it is obviously hard for the IRS to be sure it will ever actually collect any taxes due on capital gains realized in the sale, the ACT imposes a duty on the Buyer  either to establish that the Seller is a qualified US taxpayer or to withhold 10% of the sale proceeds and turn it over to the IRS. Obviously, some foreign Sellers hate this since they may well not owe any tax on a sale (or may even desire to evade the collection of any taxes owed), but find themselves being told they need to file a tax return with the IRS just to get their 10% back (much later). And if they have substantial debt on the property, the 10% withheld may even exceed the cash available to Seller. 

Happily, as in so many tax-related matters, Congress has supplied a loophole. There is an exemption to the Buyer's requirement to withhold 10% of the purchase price of property if the Buyer (not the Seller) can certify that he/she will meet the following conditions:

  • The sales price (amount realized by Seller on the sale) does not exceed $300,000.
  • Buyer is purchasing the real property to use as a residence. This is defined as having "definite plans" that Buyer or a member of his/her family, to include brother(s), sister(s), ancestor(s), descendent(s), or spouse will reside in the property for at least 50% of the number of days that the property is used by any person during each of the first two 12 month periods following the date the property is transferred to Buyer.

As you can see, this loophole is big enough to drive a bus through. After all, without trying to be too cynical, people's "definite plans" have been known to change, often as they leave the closing table and re-think their situation. I leave the interpretation of this to others. However, when a Buyer is asked to execute a FIRPTA addendum he or she is, therefore, being asked to sign a document indicating that his/her transaction meets the two conditions given above. For a further analysis and overview of FIRPTA, link here.

 

 

 


Unless otherwise stated square footage and lot dimensions appearing herein are derived from county records and may or may not be accurate.
If square footage is material to a transaction a survey or other measurement is recommended. This information deemed reliable but not guaranteed. Current or previous year’s taxes may not accurately forecast future property taxes. Property taxes can increase from one year to the next for various reasons.

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