Serbinski Accounting Firms

[quote="CanadianN-400"]Hello!

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Lastly - after I move back to Canada I will be looking for a tax advisor / firm to take care of both my Canadian and US tax needs.

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thank you[/quote]

If you are in the Vancouver area, you can consider SKL Tax. I've used them, as well as some other people I ...

[quote="CanadianN-400"]Hello!
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I am not a tax expert! What major considerations am I missing?
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[/quote]

Ways that a USC in Canada can end up owing taxed:
- Gains above $250K USD on the sale of your principal residence are taxed (exclusion is $500K USD for a USC couple).
- Gains in the sale ...

[quote="CanadianN-400"]This is so helpful, thank you!

Another question. My US friend was telling me that there is a US exit tax if you relinquish US citizenship. Is this something I need to be concerned about before I get my dual US citizenship as a Canadian citizen already?[/quote]

Look up form ...

@mrbacon
You said you "looked up renouncing citizenship and it looks absolutely brutal, way more expensive than complying".

Again, I'm not sure what you mean. There's a $2350 fee to renounce, but that's the "only" additional cost.

Note that it sounds like you *might* (emphasis "might") be able to ...

[quote="mrbacon"]tdott,

Is there any UPSIDE to being a USC in Canada? It seems everything you posted makes it a really terrible deal financially. Like a burden I will bear that others don't.

I made really poor gains since the crash back in 2008. We're talking $10,000 or less total in gains across ...

Link above is borked because the period was incorrectly incorporated into it.

Streamlined Program:
http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/Internat ... Procedures

You can get compliant using the Streamlined Program - it's the official way for non-resident non-filers to get compliant. There will almost certainly be no penalties (I've yet to hear of any), but there may be back taxes plus interest.
Ignore/Avoid/Run from OVDP (unless you are a genuine tax evader ...

[quote="nelsona"]This has been the case long before 2013, but, yes, you can elect to be treated as married.[/quote]

@nelsona
You use the word "elect" - does that mean that one has a choice of being treated as married vs being treated as single?

[quote="rlb"]tdott, re form 8854. Nope. Not, at least, according to Phil Hodgen's presentations. ... [/quote]

I'm not so sure, Phil Hodgen seems to say that you can divide community property here: http://hodgen.com/community-property-an ... nce-sheet/

[quote="nelsona"]Canada is community property as far as I know.[/quote]

Does that mean that when filling in form 8854, one can just total up the husband-wife net worth and divide by 2 to arrive at the renunciant's net worth?

Which only adds insult to injury that a person living in Canada (public health care) should have to pay it.

I believe the NIIT is new and started in the 2013 tax year.

BTW, rather than expect things to get better, (e.g., TFSA gains become non-taxable), I'd expect things to get worse (e.g., NIIT). The US is hurting for money and expats are an easy, voice-less target.

Forgot to mention the Net Investment Income Tax (NIIT). If it applies to you, this 3.8% tax is NOT creditable against foreign tax. So it is truly a case of double taxation.

You would file a 1040.

You will have to make this decision on a personal level - nobody can do it for you. However, one thing to be aware of is that the US taxes multiple things that are tax-free in Canada, so a Canada-resident US citizen can indeed end up owing taxes to the US:
- If you sell your ...

Yes, they are PFICs. However, Canadian mutual funds are treated differently from US mutual funds, which is the sort of thing NAFTA is supposed to prevent w.r.t. cross-border trade.

It's like a Canadian manufactured widget. It may be a "foreign" widget as far as the US concerned, but due to NAFTA it ...