Article by: Sam Orgill webmaster@proactpartnership.com Published: 21/12/2007

Sam Orgill of ProACT Partnership reviews the New Year!

Writing just before Christmas my mind is drawn to Christmas past at home, an idyllic time of love, joy, giving & happiness. But most of all that time of year you get the time to play board games and do the things you want.

Two of my favourite board games are Risk & Monopoly. Everyone knows Monopoly but do you know the winning strategy? It’s simple; gain the higher ground, acquire most properties at whatever cost. The only threat is with monopoly there is a large element of chance, your fate is in the lap of the Gods. If the dice roll against you through ‘bad luck’ you can lose. This happened to me once with my teenage son – I haven’t’ played since!

Strategy

Risk is a war strategy game where your armies acquire countries around the world until you achieve global domination. Unlike Monopoly, the ‘chance’ of losing is less because you can accurately assess the risk of each move you make. A calculated risk can work against you occasionally but in the long term probability dictates you will always win.

Risk v Chance

Playing Risk was my introduction to expatriate life; it becomes clear to me that successful strategies involved taking known and quantifiable risks but never take chances. Lucky people take risks, unlucky people take chances. Which brings me to Cyprus!

ProACT advise and guide people living, working or retired abroad. Specifically taking care to ensure tax efficiency, secure property investment, capital and income protection and those medical & healthcare safety nets are in place.

The common theme is providing the information and assessment of the risks of living abroad and buying overseas property. What I still see today are the unlucky expatriates with ‘problems’ are those who played monopoly and took chances that have backfired (remembering that you can win by taking chances!)

So here is my strategic New Year review of the risks involved in living abroad and the tactics you can use to stay ahead and avoid losing.

Cyprus Property

A ‘title deed’ is a legal document that shows you own a piece of land and/or property sited on a piece of land (leasehold!). Ownership is 9/10ths of the law. If you don’t have the title deeds to your property you don’t own it!

Most people buying in Cyprus do so under civil sales contracts that can go through a legal procedure know as ‘specific performance’. This means in effect the Republic of Cyprus Government guarantee you will receive the title deeds some day. That’s all and the purchaser will remain ‘title less’ until they own the title deeds.

Independent Review

So it is vital BEFORE you sign a sales contract that you check it out to ensure it gives you the safe guards and protections you need. Unfortunately, too many people take a chance and sign what’s in front of them without taking independent legal advice to assess the risks in full.

If you give your money to the seller without legal binding covenants and undertakings on his part then you will always struggle to enforce your rights in the future.

Contract Review

ProACT offer an independent contract review service before you sign in conjunction with a UK solicitor. It will save you thousands. But you can abuse your lawyer to get an independent assessment. Spending up to £500 on independent advice is a sound investment when spending £150,000 or more.

Asset Protection

So you have brought your property, is it secure? No. Without a Will in Cyprus the children benefit before the spouse with blood lines given preference to manage bonds. If you die without a will your wife and family lose control. It is vital to protect your property and business assets with an effective will and ProACT offers a specialist will writing service.

Inheritance Tax

Inheritance Tax is linked to where you come from. True, there is a nil charge in Cyprus but your home country will still make an assessment. If you are Norwegian living in Cyprus this is nil, if you are British 40%, Irish 20%. A long term strategy is in order to minimize risks any inheritance tax paid, especially utilising the benefit of low tax in Cyprus.

Professional Action

This could be a change of Domicile which involves a range of possible actions including applying for permanent residency, gifting to trusts & make will trusts. Having made your move you can claim change of domicile when it best suits you. ProACT are specialist in laying down winning strategies to avoid 40% inheritance tax.

Health & Wealth

New Year is a time to reflect on the values of health, wealth & happiness. Without your health what have you got? Are you protected in the event of illness or accident? Do you have a plan, are you playing Risk or Monopoly with your welfare? The biggest chances are taken by people working in the black market and not declaring income for tax registering your working activity and income for tax means you qualify for medical cover, child benefit, unemployment & sickness benefit and Cyprus pensions.

ProACT review and advise making risk assessments of health care available to clients. This involves EU, UK & Cyprus health services provision, Private and Self insurance. A unique independent service that brings peace of mind and security.

Immigration Visas

There is backlog of over 50,000 Cyprus Residency Visa application causing problems when obtaining title deeds, duty free cars, sales of property, or permanent residency.

So here’s some New Year cheer Cyprus have thrown out all the alien books and now residency visas are issued within a week for EU citizens, from the New Year we have the option of applying for a ‘renewal’ of your residency visa.

This is a bizarre but practical solution to years of phoning and waiting for the day your visa is finally issued and posted to the wrong address! Please ask us if you would like to apply for a ‘new’ renewal visa now and resolve the confusion and delays of the current chaotic crisis.

Review & Seminar

ProACT have announced a series of 4 free seminars for 2008 in Cyprus and the UK covering these broad issues with UK legal and expatriate experts covering tax efficiency, expatriate advice and property investment.

Meanwhile, we continue to offer free review on all aspects of living abroad aiming to identify strategies to manage risk, avoid chance and ensure health, wealth & happiness for you and your family in 2008 & beyond.

Sam Orgill

ProACT Partnership

Tel: +357 26 819 424

www.proactpartership.com

External Article Link: http://www.property-partnership.com/overseas-property-guides/overseas-property-guide.cfm?id=108

Article Link: http://www.property-partnership.com/overseas-property-guides/overseas-property-guide.cfm?id=108

Please contact the author at webmaster@proactpartnership.com for more information.