Cheapest joint current account open to Irish & non-Irish residents

Hi all,
I am looking for a cheap or free current account to receive rental income payments into. The property in question is jointly owned with my brother, who is resident in Ireland. I am resident in Germany.

If someone could point me towards a cheap or free current account that we could open jointly I would be much obliged. The account does not need to offer in-branch service, direct debits or debit cards as the funds will simply be more or less immediately forwarded (using online banking, does not need to be a mobile app) on to our own individual accounts each month.

I looked at Revolut but they say we must be resident in the same country so that doesn't work. EBS MoneyManager would "technically" work I guess but they state that it's for personal use only and I'm not sure how they'd view rental income.

All the best,
Philip

murphaph1 said:

The account does not need to offer in-branch service, direct debits or debit cards as the funds will simply be more or less immediately forwarded (using online banking, does not need to be a mobile app) on to our own individual accounts each month.

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You could simply get your tenant to split the rent into two tranches one to you and one to your brother. I don’t think that’s an unreasonable request of a tenant.

Otherwise I suspect you will run into problems trying to open a joint account while resident in two different countries. I don’t know all the products on the market, but in general from a risk basis it is simply not worth it for firms to offer this kind of thing unless you are very high value.

If you were to move back to Ireland for an while and be able to satisfy bank of this fact then I think you wouldn’t have problems.

The EBS Money Manager account states the following:

The account may only be used for personal purposes.

You must be 18 years of age or older and give us evidence with your application that you are legally resident in the European Economic Area (the "EEA") to open an account.

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So the residency stuff is not a problem for EBS at least. It may work for our purposes actually because looking at the T&Cs it also says:

The Account may only be used for personal purposes. An Account cannot be
operated for business purposes for a club, charity, trust, partnership, association, or
company.

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So maybe "personal purposes" includes receiving rental income. There's no company involved. We own this property personally.

I don't really like the idea of requesting a tenant to split rent into tranches because there's always the risk that they fail to pay one tranche etc. and then it could get messy if Revenue ever audit us. The rent would have been receivable by both of us, but only one of us would have received it. We'd then need to transfer rent across to the other to balance the books and although I have a good relationship with my brother, experience has taught me that things can change and I would like visibility of the entirety of the rent received. Therefore I would much rather the rent came in to a single account and was split 50:50 from there. The charges play a secondary role here, but the lower the better.

I can't see that receiving regular single rental income into your account is much different to having your monthly salary paid in. That sounds to me like a personal account. How many folk with income from one rental have opened a business account solely for that purpose?

In theory the EBS info you quote does suggest you may be eligible for a joint account. In practice, however, they may decline on grounds that the two of you are resident in different countries. I'd enquire.

murphaph1 said:

I don't really like the idea of requesting a tenant to split rent into tranches because there's always the risk that they fail to pay one tranche

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If they can pay one standing order they can pay two standing orders that sum to the same amount as one.

Another option is to use an agent to collect the rent and remit is separately but this will cost a lot more than the benefits.

Bunq might be an option.

If the tenant pays rent to you as a non-resident, they are supposed to deduct 20% in respect of the non-resident landlord withholding tax. This is a complication you would rather avoid. I don't think you avoid it simply by having the tenant pay the rent into an Irish bank account of the non-resident landlord.

Simplest way to solve this problem is for you to nominate your brother as your collection agent. Tenant then pays the whole rent to your brother; your brother remits your share to you, less the 20% withholding which he remits to Revenue. You get a full credit for this. Your brother can operate a dedicated bank account for this purpose.

+1 to @TomEdison's advice.

This isn't a bank charges issue, it's a question of how to structure a business arrangement.

Get appropriate professional advice unless you know exactly what you're doing.

Thanks all, duly noted. I'd still rather a joint account with my brother acting as collection agent for this property so it looks like I'll be checking out EBS and I'll report back how I get on.

murphaph1 said:

Thanks all, duly noted. I'd still rather a joint account with my brother acting as collection agent for this property

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If it's a joint account your brother is not acting as collecting agent; you are collecting your own share of the rent yourself, and so the tenant's withholding obligation kicks in.

Appoint your brother as your collection agent. Let him open an account in his own name. Let the tenant pay the entire rent into that account. let your brother send you your 50%, less the withholding, and let him send the withholding to the revenue. It's really very straightforward and it will save you a world of pain.