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Tax Planning

  • Two tax systems reach the same money, and neither one is going to tell you what the other did with it. That is the whole of cross-border tax planning in a sentence.
  • Americans remain taxable by the United States wherever they live. Spain taxes its residents on worldwide income, and on worldwide assets as well. The treaty between them prevents most double taxation, but it does not decide the order in which you act, and the order is usually where the money is.
  • The articles here work through the questions that come up most often. Whether the Beckham regime is worth applying for once you look at both returns together. What the Modelo 720 actually requires, which is narrower than most new arrivals fear and stricter than most expect. How the foreign earned income exclusion and the foreign tax credit differ, and why choosing wrong is expensive. And what California does when you leave, which is not the same as what you assume it does.
  • Start with the Beckham Law if you are moving, or Modelo 720 if you are already there.
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