Selling a house gifted from spouse

[Taxationwebdunne]

My wife bought her own house ( call it no 1) and we were very badly advised to put our 50% jointly owned house ( call it no 2) ( no mortgage) totally in her name but I have continued to live in it but she then owned 2 houses (1&2) own house (1) being her main residence. She has now transferred the full title by way of gift ( no money involved so no CGT was payable ) house 2 to me and I continue to live there as my main residence. We are still happily married and classed as living together and I am led to believe, because I now hold the full title, at some point in the future , if I choose to sell it, there will ne no CGT payable as this is and will be my primary residence. Neither houses have ever been vacant, rented or anything other than just lived in.

Is this correct ?

[someone]

No. As a married couple you can, in law, only have a single "primary residence" between you for CGT purposes at any one time. Therefore it's almost irrelevant who out of you or your wife owns which.

If you have more than one residence between you (and it sounds like you do) then you can make a nomination as to which is to be considered your primary residence - but that has to be made within two years of your residences changing. (I believe that HMRC have a concession to allow late elections but I'm not sure of the details of when/why this can apply)

If you make a PPR election then that is your primary residence for CGT purposes regardless of whether it would be considered your primary residence "on the facts". Note in particular that council tax, for example will, most likely, have one residence as your main home (for both of you) and one residence as a second home and that will be decided "on the facts" regardless of your CGT election. It is *possible* to have two main homes for Council tax purposes but councils will tend, by default, to assume that you don't and that any attempt to claim this is fraudulent. One example that might be valid is if you have jobs at opposite ends of the country and never stay in the other home other than "as a guest". If you, for example, have children who live in one home and the other is the "where I work" home where you spend every night except Saturday night (you travel "home" on Saturday and back to the work residence on Sunday) then that will still probably be your main home for Council tax even though you only stay there 1 night per week!

But if you don't make an election (and for any period where there wasn't an election) then the primary residence for CGT is decided "on the facts". I'm not 100% sure that it's the same rules as for council tax but it's probably safe to assume that it is.

Once you've made an election you can change it at any point in time - but only back date by 2 years - therefore it's sensible to make an election even if it's the same as the "on the facts" result.

(Note that elections are made in writing to HMRC, there's no set form, and they must be signed by both the married parties)

For the period that your wife owned both properties as the only owner, she could/can still make an election (subject to the 2 year time limit) unless only one of them was her residence.

[Taxationwebdunne]

Perhaps I haven't explained properly. Because my wife has transferred the title of her second home to me as a gift - she now only owns one house and I own only one house - the one I've lived in for 25 years.. the question was now I own %100% of the title of this house as my main residence would there be any CGT if I sold the house ( the only house I own ) if I were to sell it in the future because it was gifted by my spouse.

[someone]

Yes, because you and your wife combined can only have at most one PPR for CGT purposes at any given time. It doesn't matter where each of you live (it's possible for there to be zero but never possible for there to be two).

If you (both) elect the house you live in as your PPR then the house your wife lives in will not get PRR for the time that your house is elected. And vice versa, if you (both) elect the property that your wife lives in then the one you're living in will not get PRR.

If you elect neither then one or other will be the PPR but it's not always trivial to decide which one it is - although council tax main home/second home can be an indicator, even that isn't definitive in all cases.

[someone]

I've just read your other post where you say "unmarried". It makes a huge difference, if unmarried you can have two PPRs.