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Irish House and Pension

July 17th, 2014 at 10:24 pm

Here's something I didn't know until just a few days ago: D has an Irish pension! It has about $14k in it. He said he completely forgot about it, and he's not sure what the rules are about how it can be invested. He thinks you can't really touch it at all until retirement (not even to change what fund it's in or anything). Wondering if anyone knows anything about Irish pensions?

He also got the annual mortgage statement from our Irish house. As of June 30th owe 5272 euro on the house. We're paying only about 20 euro a month in interest now. Final payment will be June 21, 2015; one more year!

Our payment is 451.40 euro each month, so I am figuring that even leaving money in the Irish account like we usually do, and maybe a little more, when we own the Irish house we can add $400 a month to our principal payments on the US house. I am going to go play with my mortgage paydown calculator now...

Posted in Frugal Living | 7 Comments »

7 Responses to “Irish House and Pension”

  1. creditcardfree Says:
    July 17th, 2014 at 10:27 pm 1405636079
    1405636079

    That is a good idea! No idea about Irish pensions.

  2. Buendia Says:
    July 17th, 2014 at 10:31 pm 1405636278
    1405636278

    The whole Irish thing is confusing to me... We aren't sure what to do to get my name on the property deed either; we're waiting until the house is paid off next year (and maybe the year after when we'll take a trip over there, talk to a solicitor, etc). The house is listed in our will/trust.

  3. rob62521 Says:
    July 17th, 2014 at 11:11 pm 1405638692
    1405638692

    Talk about finding a treasure, even if you can't touch it right away! Yowza! Congrats!

  4. snafu Says:
    July 17th, 2014 at 11:47 pm 1405640863
    1405640863

    When you review the newspapers on-line from the appropriate large Irish city, how do they describe their housing market? Our Business channel regularly comments on London's advancing housing market and worrisome increase in valuations. I'm surprised that D had lost track of $ 14K of pension assets. Is it a government pension asset? Employer operated asset? Or? I think it's important to learn details of who/how it's managed and would he have any control? Age 59/60 or? Americans are required to declare all assets where ever located so you may wish to exercise caution.

    Have you been in touch with Ireland's Embassies or Consulates for general pension information?
    http://ireland.visahq.com/embassy/united-states/

    I would guess the American Embassy or Consulates in Ireland might be helpful but your income from house and pension asset would be on radar for taxable income going back even 7 years?

  5. Buendia Says:
    July 18th, 2014 at 02:38 am 1405651112
    1405651112

    D didn't lose track - he knew it was there, but just didn't think there was anything he could do with it. The scheme is a little different over there (it's a private pension). In his words "I just wasn't thinking about it." I feel like more research is in order as you've said. Not sure about age or anything, but I just made a list of questions! The amount that the pension has earned is not taxable in Ireland (just like a traditional IRA here, he paid tax on the income, then paid into the scheme).

    Prices in Dublin city centre (where our house is) are going up steadily (he does watch that regularly! In fact watches homes for sale and sold in our neighborhood). We pay tax on the house rental income in Ireland, and then report it on our US taxes. You're not taxed on the asset (capital gains) until you sell, but the tax is higher in Ireland, so we end up getting a credit on Irish taxes paid on our US taxes.

    We have bank accounts there, too, but only have to declare the interest on our taxes (not the amount that's in the bank unless the total amount of foreign bank accounts is over $10,000 at any point during the year).

    Anyway, we are very careful on our taxes! We pay Irish taxes on income in Ireland and then report the same income on US returns, but also report the tax we pay. Basically there is a double taxation treaty between Ireland and the US (most countries and the US, actually) so you don't pay double tax.

    I don't think the American Embassy would have that information, but I am going to have to figure out where to find out!

  6. CB in the City Says:
    July 18th, 2014 at 02:40 pm 1405694435
    1405694435

    I know nothing about Irish pensions; I just wanted to chime in and say how nice to have an Irish husband! I used to have a train buddy from Ireland and I always talked to him just to be able to hear him talk!

  7. ceejay74 Says:
    July 19th, 2014 at 11:08 pm 1405811332
    1405811332

    We have the same problems but with a flat and 3 pensions in England! No solutions; sorry. We've had so much to focus on that we haven't really looked too hard into whether we can do anything with them. We did conclude it wasn't easy to add our names to the ownership of the flat.

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