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When you first start pondering moving abroad, often one starts to look for advice. Whatever activity you pursue in your life, be it a difficult one or a routine task, you can always do with some help. There is no shortage of free advice on this earth, but as far as real good advice is concerned, you are left on your own to decide what is best for you. As in case of any other venture in life, when you are planning to leave the country for good, you will be left with several questions unanswered. It is true that you might be presented with thousands of ideas from hundreds of sources. However, the tips when moving abroad can only be assessed in virtual terms. Even the best advice is only good if you use it. You cannot practically try out every tip and suggestion you are offered to find out if it is really working.

So the basic point of the explanation is that regardless of what you are advised to do, you are the one who is ultimately responsible for making the right decision. You should carefully examine every option available to you before finalizing on anything. You should be always open to ideas and ready to consider them without any bias. Your best tip might come from a least expected person or source. The most important tips when moving abroad are the ones which predominantly deal with various economic factors. Your financial position should be fit enough to suit the economic conditions of the country to which you are moving. You should find out various methods to curtail your expenditure without compensating the excitement of your plan.

Your financial background is the most influential factor in this case. Most of the tips in this context rotate around possible saving and investment opportunities available abroad. It is true that nowadays you can control the saving accounts and investments in your country from any part of the world, but how far you will be able to preserve and multiply your savings depends on the economic condition of your new place. There are several factors which goes a long way in either augmenting or depleting your financial base. Standard of living, cost of living, exchange rates, inflation, rate of interest, tax rules, transportation cost, health care benefits, medical insurance policies, and senior citizen benefits are some of the few important items which has a direct impact on your wealth and reserves.

Most of the online travel and tourism reviews and websites provide you with several common tips. These tips are basic but important; however, if you want more personalized ideas and tips you should try a bit harder. The best way is to interact with people who have traversed this path before. Nowadays, communication has no known barriers. Find out from your friends and colleagues about families who have successfully settled abroad. Sharing their experiences will give you a true picture about how easy or difficult it is to move abroad. Tips when moving abroad should be prioritized according to your needs and means. Furthermore, you should be practical and calculative while choosing to implement any of them.

Accidental landlords renting out their former home – that they could not sell – may find they have much to be thankful for when the property market finally recovers.

Unlike buy-to-let landlords who are selling investment properties, those selling their former primary residence will have a built-in advantage in reducing their capital gains tax bill – assuming the market rises and there is a gain at all, of course.

There is no tax to pay when selling your main home, but a little-known quirk in the rules means that even if you move out you continue to get relief against capital gains tax for another three years. And you can get a further £40,000 in private lettings relief, which applies only when letting your former home.

Camilla Dallerup, star of BBC1′s Strictly Come Dancing, sees this as an opportunity for the future. Last year she started thinking about upgrading from her one-bedroom flat in Walton-on-Thames in Surrey to a larger home but as the recession deepened she was reluctant to sell and thought about letting instead.

‘Had it not been for the way values have fallen I might have sold this flat to buy my next place without stopping to consider,’ says Camilla, 35. ‘But I didn’t want to accept a low price, so I talked to my accountant and he helped me realise that I might be missing a really good opportunity.’

How lettings and principal private residence relief on buy-to-let works

As an example of how capital gains tax relief might work, if Camilla moved out of her flat this year and sold it for £330,000 in eight years’ time, the tax man would apportion the gain as £10,000 for each year since she bought it for £230,000 in 2007.

Camilla would get £20,000 relief for the two years she lived there and another three years, or £30,000, on top thanks to the way Revenue & Customs calculates principal private residence relief when it comes to the sale of a former main home.

Then there’s the private lettings relief, calculated as either the same amount of private residence relief already given (£50,000) or £40,000, whichever is lower. With her additional £40,000, Camilla will be exempted from paying tax on £90,000 of her gains.

But she gets an annual exemption as well (currently £10,100), so in this scenario Camilla would have a total £100,100 relief and would not have to pay any capital gains tax at all.

If her buy-to-let house increased by the same amount and she sold it, she would have to pay 18% capital gains tax from the proceeds, or £18,000.

Camilla already owns a two-bedroom house in Reading, Berkshire, which she bought as an investment in 2007 for £195,000 and lets out.

‘When I sell the Reading house I may have to pay a lot of tax on the rise in value because I have never lived there,’ says Camilla. ‘But if I live in my properties first, no matter how much the value increases, I will pay less tax when I come to sell.’

Camilla’s model good looks and high passion for dancing don’t give the impression that she would be so quick to grasp the intricacies of property tax. But in her home country of Denmark, she took a four-year business course after school, followed by a two-year apprenticeship as an estate agent before coming to Britain in 1996.

Camilla bought her Walton flat for £230,000 in late 2007, two years after splitting with her former fiance and dance partner Brendan Cole following his close friendship with Natasha Kaplinsky while the pair were filming Strictly Come Dancing.

She met her current boyfriend, former Hollyoaks actor Kevin Sacre, when filming a show for Living TV about training rescue dogs.

Kevin has a flat in Liverpool, but often visits Camilla with his dog, Sven, which he adopted from the show. It was having the dog in the flat that made Camilla think about moving to a home with a garden.

‘I could sell this flat and stretch my finances to buy a house,’ she says, ‘but if I buy a cheaper garden flat first and stay there a few years before letting it, I can add it to my portfolio and look for a house later. I think that makes more sense from a tax point of view.’

The same level of tax relief that Camilla is set to enjoy on her flat is also available to anyone who owns a second home when they sell it, as long as they have genuinely lived there.

‘People don’t realise the advantages that a period of living in a home you later sell can bring,’ says Mike Warburton, a tax adviser at the Bristol offices of Grant Thornton accountants. He frequently encounters-canny landlords with second homes who want to elect them as their main residence.

‘You have to be careful about trying to achieve this retrospectively,’ says Warburton. ‘This has to be real, it can’t be faked. By far the best way is to do what Camilla is planning to do because there are huge advantages to living in a home before letting it.’

Source: www.thisismoney.co.uk

Even if you’re buying for the long term, think of resale. If you are thinking of renting the property out, consider the location. Busy roads deter families with young children and those seeking tranquil surroundings. However, this may also be a benefit if it is close to the local shops.

Flats that are many floors up will only appeal to younger people who may not necessarily take the greatest of care with your investment! A waterfront property will always be fashionable, although people with young children may think twice before commiting. Victorian houses are the most versatile with plenty of space for large families or flat conversions (subject to planning permission of course).

Allocate quality time to your search – view as often as you can. Don’t rush in and panic buy. Combine logic and speed. Consider your Market. Do you want to rent a large property for lots of students or a medium sized flat for professionals? Do lots of homework, especially on the surrounding areas and local communities. Think long-term as well as short-term, i.e. resale.

Finally an investment, like fine wine, needs time to mature – so be patient.