Any advice for me.............

[jimmy v]

I am in the extremely lucky position to have a parents who have accumulated quite a few buy to let properties which they bought many years ago for peanuts.

They amount to about £4m worth plus the house which he lives in is another £1m approx.

They also has about another £1m worth of property in Cyprus consisting of their holiday home and some land where Dad grows his own veg.

He is fully retired and lives off his buy to let rental incomes at the moment, he is in his late 60's and now spends at least one third of his time in his holiday home in Cyprus.

Its an extremely embarrassing subject for me to raise to my father without sounding money grabbing, but it is already on my mind about what will happen with inheritance tax if he were to pass away. The idea of losing a whopping 40% on most of it doesnt bare thinking about, especially as we would have to sell half to save the other half.

Can anyone suggest a legal route to minimise or avoid the tax payable by my Sister and myself upon our inheritance.

If they were to spend longer in Cyprus would it help the situation in any way as I am sure they'd be willing if it somehow changed their tax status.

All advice greatly appreciated.

Jim

[Lee Young]

Yes basically they need to be taking advice on what gifts and trusts they can set up and wha the tax effect of those might be. Bearing in mind the need to survive 7 years from the dates of the gifts for them to "work" for IHT purposes, the sooner the better.