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Offshore Voluntary Disclosure: Introduction | International Tax Lawyer & Attorney Texas

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Hello and welcome to Sherayzen Law Office Video blog. My name is Eugene Sherayzen and I’m an international tax attorney and owner of Sherayzen Law Office, Ltd.

Today, I am standing in front of the IRS Campus here in Austin, Texas that processes Offshore Voluntary Disclosures, in particular Streamlined Domestic Offshore Procedures and Streamlined Foreign Offshore Procedures. This is the perfect spot and the perfect time to talk about what an Offshore Voluntary Disclosure is.

Let’s begin with the fact that, US taxpayers must report their foreign income and foreign assets to the IRS. If they fail to do that, they face potentially multiple and very large IRS penalties. The IRS doesn’t have the resources to audit every single US taxpayer; so, what they prefer to do is to allow US taxpayers to voluntarily resolve their prior US international tax non-compliance.

How exactly they do that depends on the facts and circumstances of each person. The IRS created these Offshore Voluntary Disclosure options which are basically programs for US taxpayers to voluntarily come forward, disclose their prior non-compliance with US international tax laws in exchange for a more lenient tax treatment. How lenient? It depends on the facts and circumstances and it depends on the voluntary disclosure option that you are using.

For example, if you are using an IRS Voluntary Disclosure Practice, that may mean a significant penalty because that option is reserved mostly for willful taxpayers. On the other hand, if you’re using the Streamlined Domestic Offshore Procedures, for example, you will get a much more lenient tax treatment because it is reserved for non-willful taxpayers and of course, if you also reside outside of the United States, the IRS gives you the best option: the Streamlined Foreign Offshore Procedures.

In my next blog, I will continue talking about Streamlined Domestic Offshore Procedures and Streamlined Foreign Offshore Procedures.

Thank you for watching, until the next time.

Austin TX IRS Campus for Processing Streamlined Disclosures | International Tax Lawyer & Attorney

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Hello and welcome to Sherayzen Law Office Video blog. My name is Eugene Sherayzen and I’m an international tax attorney and owner of Sherayzen Law Office, Ltd.

Today, I’m continuing my series of vlogs from Austin, TX. Today, is a very special day because Austin has a very important significance for me. This is the place where the IRS has it’s campus and where it accepts all of the Streamlined Disclosures: Streamlined Domestic Offshore Procedures and Streamlined Foreign Offshore Disclosures.

In fact, I am standing right in front of the building where the IRS accepts Offshore Voluntary Disclosures: 3651 Hwy 35 as you can see. This is the place where you would send your Streamlined Domestic Offshore Procedures and Streamlined Foreign Offshore Procedures and this is a huge IRS campus. I can’t really enter it because it’s Sunday, it’s closed and on top of that it is blocked off, but here I am. This is where the voluntary disclosures go.

Thank you for watching, until the next time.

Mexican Accounts & FBAR Reporting | Mexico FBAR Lawyer & Attorney

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Hello and welcome to Sherayzen Law Office Video blog. My name is Eugene Sherayzen and I’m an international tax attorney and owner of Sherayzen Law Office, Ltd.

Today, I am continuing my series of blogs from Mexico City. In the previous blog, I talked about FBAR, Form 8938, Form 8621 and Schedule B reporting concerning foreign bank and financial accounts. Today, I’d like to talk about what type of accounts are actually reportable and I’d like to focus specifically on Mexico. What type of Mexican accounts are reportable? First of all, your regular checking and savings accounts are important and fixed-deposit accounts are important. You will notice that fixed-deposit accounts are reported as separate accounts from checking accounts and savings accounts. It doesn’t matter if they are to renew or change the account numbers; it doesn’t really matter. What matters is that there is an account number associated with the fixed deposits and that’s what gets reported on the FBAR. The same rule applies to Form 8938.

Besides the regular checking, savings and fixed-deposit accounts, also all of your investment accounts and securities accounts are reportable on FBAR. Life insurance policies: if you have a life insurance contract, that’s also going to be reportable on FBAR. Investments in gold, silver and other precious metals that are placed in a general bank vault – that would be reportable on FBAR as well. Basically, what you’re looking for is a fiduciary relationship between the financial institution and you where the financial institution has access to the assets that it holds on your behalf along with an account number associated with that access.

There are other possible assets that won’t fall neatly within the categories I described, but may also be reportable on FBAR, for example, prepaid credit cards. Here, you’ll want to disclose everything to your international tax attorney to make sure that all of the assets are reported on your FBAR.

In the next blog, I will continue talking about US International tax compliance concerning Mexican assets.

Thank you for watching, until the next time.

Tax Year 2021 Foreign Account Reporting: Introduction | FBAR International Tax Lawyer

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Hello and welcome to Sherayzen Law Office Video blog. My name is Eugene Sherayzen and I’m an international tax attorney and owner of Sherayzen Law Office, Ltd.

Today, I’m continuing my series of vlogs from Mexico City. I’m in the Colonia Reforma Social and I’m thinking about your upcoming tax year 2021 tax compliance. Right now, I’d like to focus, just on your foreign financial accounts. For the tax year 2021, you will need to file certain forms for your foreign accounts.

For example, if your accounts exceed $10,000, then you will have to file an FBAR; if your accounts exceed $100,000 and you reside in the United States, then you will have to file a Form 8938. If your foreign accounts contain PFICs (passive income), then you will have to file Forms 8621. In other words, having foreign financial accounts will result in a fairly substantial amount of US tax reporting requirements depending on the actual balances that you have on your foreign financial accounts. The lower you have, the lower the compliance you have. The higher the balances that you have on your bank and financial accounts, the more compliance you will have to do.

Now, keep in mind that you also need disclose the ownership of foreign accounts, irrespective of whether you have to file FBAR, Form 8938 or Form 8621 on Schedule B. You will have to indicate that you do not have to file an FBAR if you really do not have to do it.

In the next blog, I will continue talking about your 2021 FBAR compliance.

Thank you for watching, until the next time.

Preparing for the Tax Year 2021 Compliance | US International Tax Lawyer

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Good morning and welcome to Sherayzen Law Office video blog. My name is Eugene Sherayzen; I’m an international tax attorney and owner of Sherayzen Law Office, Ltd.

I am continuing with a series of vlogs from Mexico City and today I’d like to talk about the upcoming tax season for the tax year 2021. The tax season started at the end of January 2022, and you might as well be preparing for it now, especially if you have foreign assets like foreign business ownership interests and foreign corporations, foreign partnerships or foreign disregarded entities, also if your have foreign financial accounts because you are looking at a significant amount of compliance, which has increased since the last year.

It’s not just a matter of doing the same thing that you have done in the past, it’s also a matter of taking into account the extra compliance that will come into play this year.

What you need to do right now is to start gathering all of the information for the calendar year 2021; put everything together: financial statements for the foreign corporations, financial statements for foreign trusts, if you are a beneficiary or owner of a foreign trust, financial statements for foreign partnerships, as well as things like fixed asset appreciation reports and things as simple as foreign bank account statements that will cover the entire year 2021.

In the next blog, I will continue talking more about your tax year 2021 tax compliance.

Thank you for watching, until the next time.