Hello,

I'm planning to sell the house which used to be my main residence in the UK before I moved to Switzerland a few years ago. There is a modest capital gain of about 25% (yes it's in what must be the lowest appreciating area in the UK!).

Reading some of the threads on here about the high capital gains tax on property, it occured to me that perhaps my house sale in the UK might be subject to this .... !

Other details are that since moving to Switzerland I've rented and for various reasons have not rented out my property in the UK - primarily because I've had all my furnture stored there!

Does anyone have any experience of being in this situation, or know what the case may be?

Thanks

Patrious

Have you included your UK property on your Swiss tax return? If not they will never know - until you introduce the capital here, if that is what you intend.

Otherwise, I some how doubt Grundstuckgeweinsteuer (the German for the tax on profit on property) introduced to stop speculation on the Swiss property market would apply to property abroad. How would they know what you paid and sold for? I had a property in the UK and simply included a modest assessment of its value on my Swiss tax form and transferred this to 'cash at the bank' when I sold. The cash was more than my assessment, and nothing happened...

AbFab, thanks for the reply - yes I have declared it, similarly to yourself, so hopefully that approach will work for me as well.

Sometimes laws here seem to be strictly applied, and at other times there seems to be a more 'common sense' approach. This point would not normally have even ocurred to me had I not become somewhat sensitised to laws and regulations ... although I must admit this is more through reputation than my direct experience.

Patrious