MB
17th December 2005, 10:34 AM
Hi, all. I need your help today, especially if you are from the US. I am trying to sort this with my tax advisor, but thought I'd ask here too:
for good reasons we're cashing out our two US-based retirement accounts (a 401a and a 403b). As a side thought during a phone conversation, one of the two companies mentioned to me that NZ has a tax treaty with the US whereby we could get a form from a US post office and, by sending it along with our cash-out form, could get 100% of our retirement funds instead of the usual deduction-hit amount... on the understanding that NZ will hit us on the tax later. Fine.
Well any views on THAT would be good enough -- seems like we'd 'lose' about the same amount whaetever way we do it -- but what I REALLY need avice on is this:
if we forego that method, and just pay our US tax now upfront by getting it withheld, would we somehow get double-hit on tax, once by the US and once a few months down the line by NZ once we declare the sums of cash we will have transferred to our NZ bank account this Christmas? If so, any mechanism to get our 20-30% back from one country or the other?
Or am I worrying for nothing anyway, 'cos NZ wouldn't see this as 'income' in the sense that, say, salary is obviously generated income?
By the by, we would be using this money v.soon to put towards a house purchase (by end of January it'd be used for this).
Thanks so much for any help.
for good reasons we're cashing out our two US-based retirement accounts (a 401a and a 403b). As a side thought during a phone conversation, one of the two companies mentioned to me that NZ has a tax treaty with the US whereby we could get a form from a US post office and, by sending it along with our cash-out form, could get 100% of our retirement funds instead of the usual deduction-hit amount... on the understanding that NZ will hit us on the tax later. Fine.
Well any views on THAT would be good enough -- seems like we'd 'lose' about the same amount whaetever way we do it -- but what I REALLY need avice on is this:
if we forego that method, and just pay our US tax now upfront by getting it withheld, would we somehow get double-hit on tax, once by the US and once a few months down the line by NZ once we declare the sums of cash we will have transferred to our NZ bank account this Christmas? If so, any mechanism to get our 20-30% back from one country or the other?
Or am I worrying for nothing anyway, 'cos NZ wouldn't see this as 'income' in the sense that, say, salary is obviously generated income?
By the by, we would be using this money v.soon to put towards a house purchase (by end of January it'd be used for this).
Thanks so much for any help.