Tax treatment when selling a rental property

P

patrickjd

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Hello, myself and my wife bought an apartment in 2005. Then in 2010 we needed more space because we started a family. We were lucky enough to get a mortgage and the bank allowed us to keep the apartment. We then bought a house and rented out the apartment. My question is will the fact that the apartment was not our PPR for a number of years have any bearing on the tax situation? In turn, if we sold the apartment now (after 10 years of paying down mort) for less than we paid for it would we have any tax liability on the difference bewteen the mortgage value and the selling price, seeing as we would be receiving less than the purchase price? I ask because I am hoping to avoid any nasty surprises when we sell the apartment. Thanks in advance.
 
patrickjd said:
if we sold the apartment now (after 10 years of paying down mort) for less than we paid for it would we have any tax liability
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If you sell a property for a loss, you don't incur any tax on the sale, as you haven't made any capital gain. Mortgages etc are irrelevant.

Once your NPPR, LPT and rental income tax are fully in order, that should be it.
 
T McGibney said:
If you sell a property for a loss, you don't incur any tax on the sale, as you haven't made any capital gain. Mortgages etc are irrelevant.

Once your NPPR, LPT and rental income tax are fully in order, that should be it.
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All that is upto date and paid up. Would it matter that we have not lived in it ourselves for a number of years?
 
Patrick it doesn't make any difference as you have no gain to be taxed on.

I am in the same situation however my wife also has an investment property. When the sale on my property closes in the next few weeks I will have a loss. When I am doing our tax return next year for 2016 (we are jointly assessed) I want to include the loss as my wife has shares that when sold we will have a gain on and want to offset this capital loss against the capital gain from her shares which we will hold off selling until later this year (after sale completes) or 2017. I assume we could also use this loss to put against my wife's investment property if it makes a gain when we sell that one?

Can anyone tell me how do I calculate what portion of the loss I can put on the return - Apt bought and lived in as my PPR from Dec 2006 to April 2012. Rented from April 2012 till October 2015. Vacant from November 2015 until now.
 
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PPR applies to period it was your PPR plus 12 months/ total period of ownership.

So 77/112 would be exempt so 35/112 is allowable as a loss.
 
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