MilesAndSmiles Posted March 4, 2015 Report Share Posted March 4, 2015 Hi all! My wife and I are looking forward to retiring at age 60/62 in 2017 after our youngest graduates High School. For the moment our plan is to spend the warm months in a little vacation home we own on a lake, and the cold months RVing. We'd expect to go full full-time after a couple of years. But, it's all so up in the air! Our vacation home is in New Jersey, but NJ is FAR from being a friendly tax state. I figure it will cost us about $8000-10000/year just to maintain the "vacation house" between taxes, insurance, and upkeep. (Currently we cover that by renting the place out on weeks and weekends we are not using it.) So it's an expensive little (650 sq. ft) "home base." Anyway, we are just now starting to figure out the best plans for us, knowing that we both want to spend years on the road! (We don't even own an RV yet! We've just rented for several vacations.) So, enough rambling! Nice to meet y'all and hope to chat as we try to figure everything out. Jeff 2004 Fleetwood Southwind 37A Retired and loving it! www.milesandsmiles.us Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NJTroy Posted March 4, 2015 Report Share Posted March 4, 2015 Welcome! I'm relatively new here as well with a 2017 date to leave NJ. I was born here, but it just costs too much to retire here. We will be full timing without a home base of any kind for a couple years, with a general plan to eventually settle somewhere else. I will miss the state, it's been my home for most of my life. But I just can't justify the property taxes, the income taxes, the cost of living, the cost of insurance, the sales taxes and on and on and on. It's not a retirement friend state on any front. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barbaraok Posted March 4, 2015 Report Share Posted March 4, 2015 I might suggest that you do the opposite, get a place in a snowbird area and travel in the summer. Many more places to go between April and November and then just enjoy the warm weather during the winter months in one place. We like the desert in the winter, so that's what we've done - purchased a park model for our winter retreat, and will travel during the summer when it is too hot to stay north. I think you will find that you can do that for a lot less and will be able to see more of the country if you travel during spring, summer & fall, than if you sit still for those months. Barb Barb & Dave O'Keeffe 2002 Alpine 36 MDDS (Figment II), 2018 Ford C-Max HYBRID Blog: http://www.barbanddave.net SPK# 90761 FMCA #F337834 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigjim Posted March 4, 2015 Report Share Posted March 4, 2015 Welcome, it is good to begin sorting things out early. You will need a permanent "home" address somewhere. Now is a good time to research the ramifications of your property in NJ. There are some nice folks here lately that kept their home but became "residents" of South Dakota for tax purposes and now they are in a bind about their capital gains on their home. I don't understand it all exactly but as I understand it you can only do this for property in your home state but even though they owned it all along the fact that they changed residency more than 2 years ago it will end up costing them on the capital gains. My point being that there is a lot involved to do it right if you own property. Of course they did save on income tax and other taxes and expenses in SO.Dakota. Hopefully it will work out for them. You can get some good advice here but it is wise to cross check anything legally important. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gypsy Traveler Posted March 4, 2015 Report Share Posted March 4, 2015 Hi! My husband and I looked at RV's and trailers for 4 years before we made the big leap. At first, we didn't even plan on taking the plunge now, we were going to put it off for a couple more years but then we decided 'why wait', and we're hitting the road in 3 weeks! Welcome and keep following your dream! It's all fine and dandy until someone's marshmallow catches fire! 2015 Ford F-250 6.2L (She ain't diesel but she hauls ass!) 2012 Jayco Pinnacle 36KPTS Http://www.5thwheelgypsy.blogspot.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
whj469 Posted March 5, 2015 Report Share Posted March 5, 2015 There are some issues regarding capital gains taxes on your home. I was born and raised in Cranford, NJ, until I went off to collage in Florida. I move to CO then CA and have been in Texas for 41 years. My parents got their home in 1960 in Cranford for $18,500 and when my father sold it in 2002 the first person who saw it paid the full asking price, $255,000, this was done without a realtor. About 20 years prior, my parents bought a condo in Hollywood, Florida, but they always keep the NJ house as their residence because of the capital gains issue. They went to Florida every winter. NJ was a very expensive place to live with their real estate taxes at $7,000 per year in 2002. Please be careful because I wouldn't want you to suffer a big capital gains issue. Good Luck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MilesAndSmiles Posted March 5, 2015 Author Report Share Posted March 5, 2015 Wow. I'm glad I'm starting to think about this now, because it all seems overwhelming. The whole issue of domicile is pretty complicated. We will have to talk this over with our accountant well in advance. I agree that in the long run we will want to travel summer and find a nice small "home base" where we can hunker down in the winter. It's too bad that NJ is SO expensive. Despite what you hear on TV this is a beautiful state. Our local newspaper had an article yesterday saying that most people want to leave, and the reason is the cost of living. 2004 Fleetwood Southwind 37A Retired and loving it! www.milesandsmiles.us Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
R. Walter Posted March 5, 2015 Report Share Posted March 5, 2015 Can someone describe what the capital gains issue is? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LindaH Posted March 5, 2015 Report Share Posted March 5, 2015 Can someone describe what the capital gains issue is? The proceeds from the sale of your PRINCIPAL home is not subject to capital gains unless the profit is more than $250,000 (single) or $500,000 (married) *and* you have lived in the house for 24 months out of the last 5 years (does not have to be consecutive 24 months). IRS Publication 523 has all the rules regarding the sale of your home: http://www.irs.gov/publications/p523/index.html "If you sell your home at a significant profit (gain), some or all of that gain could be taxable. However, in most cases, if the home you sold counts as your main home, the first $250,000 of gain is not taxable—$500,000 if you are married and filing jointly." " If your home was your residence for at least 24 of the months you owned the home during the 5 years leading up to the date of sale, you meet the residence requirement. The 24 months of residence can fall anywhere within the 5-year period. It doesn't even have to be a single block of time. All you need is a total of 24 months (730 days) of residence during the 5-year period." LindaH 2014 Winnebago Aspect 27K 2011 Kia Soul Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigjim Posted March 5, 2015 Report Share Posted March 5, 2015 The actual change of domicile is not complicated but the side issues of timing the change and the other things like property owned and taxes is extremely relevent and need to be understood and thought through. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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