Andrew Nicholl

So if a Kiwi moves to Australia for work and they become an Australian tax resident, their New Zealand rental property is also subject to the new Australian rules.

on the New Zealand property.

So it doesn't matter that you own a rental property in Auckland, it's treated with the same Australian tax rules.

And this could be a trap because the Australian tax department, they don't care where the property is, they care where the owner is and where they're domiciled from a tax residency standpoint.

So you could end up paying these capital gains tax even though you're a Kiwi.

Yeah, so a Kiwi couple who had already moved to Australia and they're living there.

They had a new build property under contract with one of our team here and confirmation was coming up.

They were doing their due diligence.

They walked into an Australian tax accountant and thought, well, we'd better get the advice around this tax side of things.

They walked in very optimistic.

And they walked out and cancelled that contract.

And the reason they did that was because they're now going to be paying capital gains tax on that New Zealand property as if it was owned in Australia because they're captured by that Australian rule.

So what you're saying is they move back to New Zealand and want to carry on owning that property for another 20 years.

They've got to pay the capital gains tax, even though they still own it.

How do they pay that money?

I think the number one thing, like you said before, is talking to an accountant because you want to find out what applies to you specifically.

But the other thing is that new builds across the Tasman are going to have more advantages compared to older properties from a tax perspective.

So here in New Zealand, we do have those benefits like lower deposits and easier to get the funding because the debt to income ratio rules don't apply.

Aussies, they haven't had those same advantages.

I think there was some advantages from state to state with the stamp duties, but now they're going to actually have quite a clear distinction around some of the more significant tax rules.