In the news

NOT IN THE NEWS. There has been celebrations in various places in NI following the death of Queen Elizabeth. Fireworks and parties etc. Some bars are having parties to celebrate too. Not sure if there are similar celebrations in England - these stories do not seem to be making the news.

Does this work for non-primary homes? I thought they fell under different rules. No idea what was just an assumption. I think the reason more homes aren't passed down more than 7 years before the parent dies is that they then have to pay market rent to the inheritor don't they? And families either feel uncomfortable with that or the parent can't afford it.

I'm deliberately not watching any media atm. I know I'll find it all too surreal. When will things be a bit more sane? Maybe seeking out non-UK media outlets is best for a little while...

Just pirate things, then you never need deal with adverts or topical things, just great media without lots of subscription charges

Just pirate things, then you never need deal with adverts or topical things, just great media without lots of subscription charges

Is there an explainer, for the thick, as to how to do this?

In essence it's only:

1. How to torrent without using your home computer. I.e Google "seedbox". https://greycoder.com/best-seedbox/
   
2. Where to find good sources of torrents. Again Google is your friend. https://old.reddit.com/r/All_about_Torrents/comments/s27ebd/torrent_sites_that_actually_work/
   
   

Use a VPN and lots of adblocking weekend you visit torrent sites. And never ever pay anything or download and run software from them. You're only there for the torrent files or magnet links that you then enter into the seedbox

Only one is a village in Scotland where the owner of a fish and chip shop pop a champagne

I know I'll find it all too surreal.

I asked the bloke next to me in the pub to pinch me.

You won’t pay IHT (and only a small number of estates (homes + stuff) actually do so it’s not really worth normal folks doing this)

You will pay capital gains if / when you dispose of the home (only the primary home can be sold CGT exempt) either way you do it - and it will be a lot.

The strong emotions regarding inheritance tax become absurd if you compare IHT to VAT. With VAT you pay a transaction tax for almost everything you buy, yet you don't hear people getting very worked up over it. Sure, once in a while you come across someone arguing that we should lower it, or maybe differentiate it in some way, but it's hardly a contentious issue for most. It's just a boring technocratic debate for the very few.

But try suggest that you could pay a slightly lower transaction tax for everything you buy from today util the end of your days, in exchange for paying a higher transaction tax for offloading your assets to your sprogs once you are properly dead. It can bring people into a purple faced spluttering rage.

The reason that doesn't tend to happen is that for it to be a true gift the parent then has to pay rent (at market value) to the children.

My point was more that there are already exemptions covering this, just that if properties continue to rise in price they may need updating to reflect that. To be honest, if it were me, I'd only be setting it at the average property price or similar so anything expensive would still get caught.

I'm referring to "family" homes, which I assume to be primary residences for parents and children.

Otherwise they're just parental homes, and non-primary, and there doesn't seem to be anything harsh about taxing the massive increase in wealth that inheritance of them brings.

The compromise idea (which I thought was a good one) is that you should have to declare inheritances on your Self Assessment and pay tax at your marginal income tax rate.

No idea why there might be resistance to IHT changes

Not contesting the idea of inheritance tax at all. For some reason I thought this started with some chat about royals so was thinking of property owned not necessarily primary residence.
But in any case I still think the reason more people don't avoid inheritance tax in what would seem to be a straightforward way (give it to your kids earlier) is because of the rent thing.

That, and it would mean that you have no funds to pay for your dotage.

What with state care homes being an absolute travesty of underfunding, and private homes running to 6 figures a year.

At least paying for it yourself means avoiding IHT, insofar as you have no money left to tax.

Anyway. Rambling tangents.

If you're interested, I have a great wheeze for avoiding IHT. It involves marrying your in-laws. I'm pretty sure that the landed classes do this on the regular.

The short version is: forget about a VPN. Just install utorrent and Tor on any PC and go to Pirate Bay. If you have only one PC, no worries, just do it on that. Takes 3 mins to set up. I know the nerds say it's not secure, but it's secure enough. Nothing bad happens. Been doing it for years. I could write an idiot's guide if it would help.

September 19th is the funeral and will be a bank holiday.

Time to book a long weekend break then, or will that be punishable as treason?

Ta.

I could write an idiot's guide if it would help.

This would help.

Blessed as I was to get a response from @Velocio, I didn't understand a word of it.

I am frightened of computers.

Good point about paying for care and yes I think that happens regularly.

marrying your in-laws

How does that get you out of IHT? (and why is both the I and H in there?)

Divorce your partner, marry the in-law. In-law dies, you inherit their stuff with no tax. Marry your erstwhile partner again, and you're all good (although there would no doubt be probatey stuff to deal with - I've not given it that much thought, as it's a bit much to actually consider it in real life).

Why the H? Who knows.

YES! We'll be travelling back from Scotland on the Sunday, nice to have an extra day to decompress, er I mean, mourn the queen.

I’m flying back from a work thing on the Saturday so will be nice to have a two day weekend- thanks Liz.