RetireJapan

Hi,
I'm in the process of selling my UK property and will move to Japan in March on a spouse visa (Japanese wife). We currently have a joint current account in the UK but to provide some safety I will open an NS&I savings account to deposit the considerable house sale funds. Are there any likely gift tax issues in transferring from a joint savings account to what will be one of two individual Japanese accounts in the future? Would separate UK savings accounts be better? Or is this not an issue? I really would like to minimise the amount of accounts to manage so a joint account, if no issue, would be best. I'm also not entirely clear on the "gift" arrangements from husband to wife or vice-versa or, in this case, from a UK joint account.

Thanks for any help.

I was actually in the a similar position a few years back and used Currencies Direct to send all the cash in my name to my account here, before transferring half to my wife’s account. I checked if that was OK with the tax office here, and they said they would not view that as a gift since the original capital from the house sale was clearly half/half. I think problems only come if, for example, you send money from a joint account that has come from your earnings/sale of your house/inheritance etc to your wife’s account.

Thanks for that. I intend to keep my earnings separate as I'll carry on doing some remote work for a while (albeit in another joint account).

So a joint savings account in the UK with our savings/proceeds from the house sale can essentially be transferred to my wife's (or my) Japanese account even via my individual account in Japan ie it's the source of the original funds that counts not how it gets to where it's going?

That makes total sense to me - I just don't want to be caught out by some archaic Japanese rule.

Yes, that’s my understanding. It seemed to me something that the tax guy we spoke to took a common sense approach to, though there are incredibly complex rules surrounding shared spousal money (according to my sister in law who helped me research it).

To make the money trail crystal clear, you might look at making two equal transfers direct to your individual accounts here, but that would of course incur more fees. Also, you would get a much better rate with a currency broker than any UK bank will offer, so worth looking into Currencies Direct, Transferwise or the like. And the more you send the better the rate so with a substantial sum you will be quids in.