Buying a House in Thailand- American tax Issues

[HerewardtheWake]

Any comments from fellow Americans or others who have had experience in the following would be appreciated:

 

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) rules  under Form 8938 for real estate owned abroad  are:

 

1. A personal residence abroad need not be reported. At least that is the general opinion among tax consultants seen on the Web, because the Form 8938 is somewhat fuzzy on this.

   However, there may be some kind of threshold above which it needs to be reported.  Is that correct?

 

2 . If a house is owned through a foreign corporation, it should be reported as an asset. 

 

   One buys a house in Thailand by forming a corporation. Under the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) rules, such ownership comes under a Controlled Foreign Corporation (CFC), and must be           reported on Form 5471.  So, the house should be reported as an asset. Is there a value threshold below which it need not be reported? I could not find clear information on this.

 

3. Does owning a residence of say $500,000 value invite undue attention from the IRS in terms of scrutiny or audit?

 

Grateful for any learned comments.

[KhunLA]

Instead of asking about the IRS ...

... as yourself why you'd want to spend half mill $$ on a house in TH, that you can't own.

 

Or if having that amount to spend, anywhere, why Thailand at all.

 

Wouldn't be my choice if I still had a half mill in the bank and looking to be elsewhere.  Pretty sure it wouldn't be TH.

[RamenRaven]

If it's in your wife's name, and she does not have a social security number, then no.

 

Otherwise, I would ask a tax professional.