I just got off the phone with IRS Medic @k0d3g3ar.
The lawyer I spoke to said that I didn't need to report the real estate I purchased, and the income I received from the sale of our house didn't meet the $10,000 USD threshold, but I once had more than $10,000 USD in a Philippine bank while I was here. That needs to be reported!
He said that a program for serious non-reporters who were more willful is now closed, but that non-willful reporters like myself can still avail the non-penalty route.
I am very grateful for his help and advice but it will be really difficult for me to convince my wife to pay the $1,500 USD retainer. If I had no choice than I would have no choice but I think I might be able to do the paperwork myself.
I have a lot of documentation covering a mental illness that I've been getting treatment for, and I think I can make an obvious case that I was a non-willful non-reporter, but I plan on paying the lawyer I spoke with $100 - $200 USD for the free consultation they gave me on the phone - I just have to discuss it with my wife first. He was so helpful and so informative!
I'm very happy for you that you chose to address the situation with the best professional advice. I was a bit worried that if you went directly to the IRS without the knowledge of this from proper professionals that you could be trapped into something you didn't need to be in. I take it that if you need a retainer of that size, then there are past filings needed to be done by them. We encountered the same situation and it took 6 years of past filings to cover our previous liabilities for non-willfull lack of filings. They took care of all of this for us, and it was pretty simple - we provided the documentation they needed, and then signed the appropriate forms and they did the filing. I actually hired them again for the 2017 tax year to do the FBAR filings for us (nowhere near the $1500 "cleanup" fees), but just because I don't need to make a mistake in this and the complexities are deep. If you get a chance to review a lot of Anthony Parent's videos on YouTube you will see just how tricky this can be if you don't know what you are doing. I think a simple FBAR is not complex, but often if it is a retirement fund then you have this issue of whether it is a "trust" and then it comes down to whether you have control of it or not. There are different filing requirements for each case and that's why I just chose to pay them to do it. In the end it is peace of mind.
You do start to resent the way that the IRS think they can extort Americans no matter where on this planet they live. There are only a handful of countries that do this - everyone else (incl. my home country of Australia) just do residence based taxation (that is you pay tax where you reside, not both in that local jurisdiction but also to your home country). There's another guy on YouTube you might enjoy "Nomad Capitalist". His name is Andrew Henderson and he is an American who recently renounced his citizenship and chose to live offshore in a number of countries and live the nomadic lifestyle. Not sure if I could do that, but it is interesting to see how someone like him has many passports and does pretty well for himself.
Anyway glad all this information helped you out. I agree - write a blog post about it. These posts live on for a long time and Google will index it and you may just help out the next guy out there too.
You motivated me to write a blog article about this. Here: https://steemit.com/bitcoin/@k0d3g3ar/us-taxpayers-and-crypto-don-t-get-along-that-well
It's a good article @k0d3g3ar and I resteemed it 👏👏👏
I just got off the phone with IRS Medic @k0d3g3ar.
The lawyer I spoke to said that I didn't need to report the real estate I purchased, and the income I received from the sale of our house didn't meet the $10,000 USD threshold, but I once had more than $10,000 USD in a Philippine bank while I was here. That needs to be reported!
He said that a program for serious non-reporters who were more willful is now closed, but that non-willful reporters like myself can still avail the non-penalty route.
I am very grateful for his help and advice but it will be really difficult for me to convince my wife to pay the $1,500 USD retainer. If I had no choice than I would have no choice but I think I might be able to do the paperwork myself.
I have a lot of documentation covering a mental illness that I've been getting treatment for, and I think I can make an obvious case that I was a non-willful non-reporter, but I plan on paying the lawyer I spoke with $100 - $200 USD for the free consultation they gave me on the phone - I just have to discuss it with my wife first. He was so helpful and so informative!
P.S. Maybe I will write a blog post about them ☺
I'm very happy for you that you chose to address the situation with the best professional advice. I was a bit worried that if you went directly to the IRS without the knowledge of this from proper professionals that you could be trapped into something you didn't need to be in. I take it that if you need a retainer of that size, then there are past filings needed to be done by them. We encountered the same situation and it took 6 years of past filings to cover our previous liabilities for non-willfull lack of filings. They took care of all of this for us, and it was pretty simple - we provided the documentation they needed, and then signed the appropriate forms and they did the filing. I actually hired them again for the 2017 tax year to do the FBAR filings for us (nowhere near the $1500 "cleanup" fees), but just because I don't need to make a mistake in this and the complexities are deep. If you get a chance to review a lot of Anthony Parent's videos on YouTube you will see just how tricky this can be if you don't know what you are doing. I think a simple FBAR is not complex, but often if it is a retirement fund then you have this issue of whether it is a "trust" and then it comes down to whether you have control of it or not. There are different filing requirements for each case and that's why I just chose to pay them to do it. In the end it is peace of mind.
You do start to resent the way that the IRS think they can extort Americans no matter where on this planet they live. There are only a handful of countries that do this - everyone else (incl. my home country of Australia) just do residence based taxation (that is you pay tax where you reside, not both in that local jurisdiction but also to your home country). There's another guy on YouTube you might enjoy "Nomad Capitalist". His name is Andrew Henderson and he is an American who recently renounced his citizenship and chose to live offshore in a number of countries and live the nomadic lifestyle. Not sure if I could do that, but it is interesting to see how someone like him has many passports and does pretty well for himself.
Anyway glad all this information helped you out. I agree - write a blog post about it. These posts live on for a long time and Google will index it and you may just help out the next guy out there too.