file photo by ArtChick
Three-quarters of certified public accountants in New Jersey have advised clients to leave the state because of the estate and inheritance taxes, according to the head of the New Jersey Society of CPAs.
That tax is ending – and so is the advice, even before the law is off the books, said Ralph Albert Thomas, the CPA group’s chief executive officer and executive director.
“Not only our members, but I know estate attorneys have been sending out correspondence about, look, they need to reconvene with their clients to relook at what they proposed,” Thomas said.
The survey found 83 percent of respondents felt estate and inheritance taxes had prompted clients to leave New Jersey. A follow-up survey is planned for the spring, to see how much the advice has changed.
The estate tax is paid on approximately 3,500 estates annually, around 5 percent of the approximately 70,000 deaths in the state each year.
Currently, New Jersey’s estate tax threshold is $675,000. The full value of any estates worth more than that is taxed. That will be changed to a $2 million exclusion at the start of 2017 – meaning, for instance, that an estate worth $2.5 million would be taxed on the $500,000 over the excluded amount.
The tax is then eliminated entirely at the start of 2018.
Read More: Estate tax cut already changing CPAs’ advice to flee New Jersey | https://nj1015.com/estate-tax-cut-already-changing-cpas-advice-to-flee-nj/?utm_campaign=Observer_NJ_Politics&utm_content=New%20Campaign&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_term=New%20Jersey%20Politics&trackback=tsmclip
