I have come in for some intemperate reaction to my post in this thread in the Singing Pig investment forum. I only really reactivated my membership of Singing Pig in the hope that I'd attract some interest in my offer of syndicated direct participation in the Chinese real estate market. Contact me for details!!
I am not sure what Pod is talking about: he doesn't actually refute any of my points, but simply calls them 'stupid advice'. Having invested via a limited company for about a decade now I am fairly confident that there are no major tax penalties: I haven't paid a penny in tax on my investment, so I don't think that investing personally could actually lower my tax rate.
Of course the key tax to avoid is Capital Gains Tax. I have had various conflicting pieces of advice about this from a number of fully-qualified Chartered Accountants. I believe that the correct interpretation of the law is that Chargable Gains is payable as part of the Corporation Tax charge if the gain is not offset against current-year costs.
I have recently been advised by a very well-connected party that conversion requirements for REITs will soon be reduced to the point that AIM listing is all that is required. Of course the reason that the tax authorities have taken such a generous approach to taxation to real estate investment companies is that they want to prevent them moving overseas. I have no idea of the benefits of doing this.
It is my experience that a lot of UK residential property investment is conducted by people who are in a position to achieve non-domicile status, who put their properties in overseas-registered limited companies. It is really quite extraordinary how much ingenuity is generated by the cash incentive of reduced tax liabilities.
