Inheritance tax planning

I don't claim to be an expert on inheritance tax but there are a few basic things that people should address.

The first thing you should do is MAKE A WILL! and keep it updated.

It is the middle classes who will have the hardest time avoiding this tax. If you are filthy rich, say £100 million, it's not too much of a hardship to give most of your money away while there's still a good chance of surviving the required 7 years and struggling to survive by hanging onto a couple of million. If your house and savings, that you need to live on, make up all of your assets you can't give them away. It's also difficult to shield them from inheritance tax and still have access to them.

The other thing to consider is when you snuff it the executors of your will have to find the money to pay the tax before they get access to the assets. Usually this means the executors have to borrow money and pay interest. The amount involved can easily get into 6 figures.

Suggestions

Annual gifts. You can make annual gifts out of capital of £3,000. If you didn't use all of the previous years allowance you can use the remainder in the current year. Between a husband and wife that's £6,000 a year.

Small gifts. You can make as many small gifts, of up to £250 each, as you like out of income.

Gifts out of income. It's a bit harder to prove but if you can show that gifts have come out of income without impacting on your lifestyle then those are free of inheritance tax as well. It's difficult to show that a single gift qualifies but if there is a regular pattern it is much easier.

Use your nil rate band. Most wills leave everything to the husband/wife first and then to the kids. Although the nil rate band is transferable to a surviving spouse, that surviving spouse might remarry and fail to do a new will. Then the new spouse gets your assets when the survivor dies and not your kids. You should prepare “Mutual” (not “Mirror”) wills to provide some protection.

Money in a pension fund. If you have the right sort of fund you can name who gets the fund when you die. Usually the trustees aren’t bound to comply with your wishes so it’s not part of your estate. Of course you are trusting someone you probably have no reason to trust but they have to comply really or, when the word gets out, nobody will trust them with a pension pot again.

Paying the tax

There are a few ways in which you can make provision for the executors to pay any inheritance tax due. You can buy an insurance policy. Usually these are whole of life second death policies and they are written into trust. Another way is for the executors to complete Inland Revenue form D20 asking your bank to pay funds directly from your account to the Inland Revenue.

Your home

If you have plans to try and shelter your home from inheritance tax, forget it. Gordon Brown changed the law so it's not worth it. But consider an asset protection trust, it means your home is owned by the trust and goes to the beneficiaries specified in the trust deed. These are expensive but worth it

In brief...