This week I’ve been giving advice to a new client about transferring her house into her name and her daughter, as joint tenants, so that it does not form part of her estate and be the subject of a claim by her other daughter, from whom she has been estranged for 14 years.
The transfer will be a gift, but could nevertheless be liable for transfer duty, based on the value of the interest being transferred.
The half interest is worth about $200k-$300k, well under $430,000.00 first home buyer threshold, the daughter lives in the house and will continue to do so after settlement, and she has never owned a house before, so she will be entitled to the first home buyer duty concession and pay no duty, a saving of potentially, $8,835.00.
The settlement agent she was going to get to do the transaction was just going to get her to pay the full amount of transfer duty.
Just to be sure, we will make the deed of gift conditional on transfer duty being assessed as Nil or nominal duty, which is always a good idea for these and family farm transactions and other transactions about which there is some doubt concerning transfer duty.
For deeds of gift and transfer duty advice, see Michael Paterson & Associates.