For business owners it’s never too soon to start their tax and estate planning process. It’s important that some of this planning be done at the point of starting or buying the business. In reality though, that’s not always how things happen.
From time-to-time I’ve come across high net worth business owners that are trying to make sense of their overall business tax structure, wealth management, and estate planning. If your company or group of companies were setup wrong, don’t worry. There are ways to fix it now without triggering the taxes.
The first part of the process is to understand the entire personal and corporate picture. To do so, we need to review all the corporate and personal:
- Past 3 years of tax returns
- History of CRA account balances
- Personal Cumulative Net Investment Loss
- Personal Capital Gains Exemption
- Corporate Refundable Dividend Tax on Hand
- Corporate Capital Dividend Account
- Financial statements
- Formal business valuations if available
- Future expectations for business profitability
- Potential upsides and downside risks to future business valuations
- Corporate minute books with central securities registers
- Retirement objectives
- Investment account details
- Liability details
- Potential retirement liabilities
- CPP statement of contributions and pending retirement benefits
- Retirement date – if any
- Legacy objectives
- Deferred/future tax liabilities at death
- Estate transfer concerns
After having a better understanding of the current situation, we can make recommendations for tax shelter opportunities, long-term tax strategies, and corporate reorganization recommendations.
If you do require a reorganization, you can avoid paying taxes through an estate asset freeze and Section 85 rollover. This step would also require you to file form T2057 with your corporate tax return.
Please contact our office to request a free 1 hour introductory consultation on your corporate wealth management estate planning.