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New Yorkers Trying to Evade High State Taxes Find Appearing To Have Moved To Another State Isn’t So Easy.

mirimir 8y ago
Right, what's hard is faking it, or moving just partially.
pulse7 8y ago
Yes, tax collectors are just checking if you really moved or not. So if you really move, then you will have (almost) no problems.
- praffer 8y ago
  I wouldn't say "no problems." I've been through a New York State residency audit and it was protracted, stressful, intrusive, and expensive (for representation -- worth every penny), even though I had indeed really moved (long before the audit and not specifically for tax reasons), had loads of evidence to that effect, and was confident I would prevail in the end. (I did.) It was very unpleasant having it hanging over me for the better part of a year and I definitely thought of it as a major problem, perhaps the major problem in my life at the time, until it was resolved.
  - tomohawk 8y ago
    This definitely gives me pause when considering moving to a high tax state like NY. It sounds like the kind of state where you pay your taxes and just hope the government leaves you alone, which is likely untrue if you are or become a high earner. This kind of stuff will likely be litigated for years, especially as people with means are being harassed in this way. It will be interesting to see which of these tactics ultimately pass muster. I wonder if you could bring a RICO suite.
    - radicaldreamer 8y ago
      You're buying into a lot of FUD here, there are more high earners in New York and California than many other states and very few have the kinds of problems you're describing.
      - wernercd 8y ago
        But with pushes to enact higher and higher and higher taxes specifically TARGETING higher earners... the problem is something that will become more pronounced as those higher taxes will drive more away. Whether we are talking tens... or tens of hundreds... it's still nice to know about a minefield as you work to escape from it.
        throwaway5752 8y ago
        "But with pushes to enact higher and higher and higher taxes specifically TARGETING higher earners... the problem is something that will become more pronounced as those higher taxes will drive more away." Which pushes, can you cite a few or a trend where the distribution of tax load is shifting? Isn't NYS trying like crazy to lower higher income bracket taxes because the Federal deduction for property taxes was decreased?
      - tomohawk 8y ago
        People being harassed because they moved out of state is not FUD. Its abuse, and it definitely happens. Why would I move to a state and have a career there if I know at the end of my career I'll be at peak earnings and at that time want to move elsewhere for retirement or pre-retirement? Many people in my state move at that time to other states for tax reasons or cost of living reasons. They know they won't be able to afford to live in the high priced state when their earnings drop. I know of at least one person who's in the process of moving to FL, and they received legal advice to save all receipts and other evidence. The only reason they received this advice is due to the widespread abuse by the state. Not a NYer, but I
    - dsfyu404ed 8y ago
      >It sounds like the kind of state where you pay your taxes and just hope the government leaves you alone, That has much more to due with how the people and the government believe government should act than it does with the taxes themselves. ME and VT are fairly high tax but politicians would be hanging from bridges (edit: it should be obvious that this is an exaggeration) if the ME or VT government tried to behave like the NY or MA government because the people simply don't see that sort of government style as how things should be and the government is a large organization made up of people.
- phil21 8y ago
  Yeah I thought this too until I ran afoul of things. Right before SoL expired my old state said I owed them for 3 years of taxes going back 5 years previous. At that point I no longer had much documented proof I had really (legitimately) moved - since I had moved back to original state by then. Sworn statements from employers/colleagues/etc. weren't enough, and to fight it would have cost more than the amount "due". In the end I paid it, with the state tax representative even outright stating "I might even believe you, but it's going to cost you more to fight us in court over it than just paying". And right he was. I learned some lessons about record keeping - but the fact I needed to "prove my innocence" vs. the other way around was absurd.
  - throwaway5752 8y ago
    Didn't you pay rent/have a landlord, forward your address, or pay utilities/taxes in your new state? Sworn statements are next to useless, but how did you manage to get into a place where you couldn't produce those types of records? I moved between states (for a bonus, moving out of a notoriously high tax state) and never had a thousandth of the issues you describe.
    - thedufer 8y ago
      None of those are considered evidence that you've lost state residency (otherwise a second home would be sufficient for New Yorkers to avoid taxes). I'm currently preparing to move out of New York temporarily, and the advice from my tax advisor is to use a credit card or make a call from a cell phone at least every 3 days, and hold on to the credit card statements/cell phone records. The odds that I will be audited upon returning seem to be somewhere north of 90%, and New York is of the opinion that you are a resident unless you can prove otherwise.
      - gamblor956 8y ago
        What your tax advisor suggested is even less relevant than a apartment rental agreement, as you can make calls and use credit cards on vacation... What is evidence of change of residency is change of voter registration and acquiring a driver's license in your new state of residence. Coupled with proof of a non-New York address, it shifts the burden to NY to prove that you are no longer one of their residents.
latch 8y ago
Except if you do legitimately move, it seems like you'd still be subject to fairly invasive scrutiny (credit card statements, phone transaction, ...) The original title is accurate, it appears hard whether you do it legitimately or not.
- throwaway5752 8y ago
  Why is that bad? Why should legit NYS taxpayers subsidizer free-riders? I hope they scrutinize relocations.
  - njarboe 8y ago
    The government should not mess with people without probable cause?
    - UncleEntity 8y ago
      Apparently data mining is probable cause. I'm kind of curious how much data they're mining though, obviously they need fine-grained details to figure out someone is spending too much time in the state to have "renounced" their citizenship so they must have at least individual credit card transactions and (possibly) cell phone location data.
WalterGR 8y ago
FTA: “Taxes are generally subject to a three-year statute of limitations from when a return is filed, but taxpayers who start spending more time in New York even years after they’ve made a move -- like around the birth of a grandchild -- may come to auditors’ attention and be forced to provide evidence of a move that happened a decade or more in the past.”
- compsciphd 8y ago
  even with that, wouldn't they only be able to go back 3 years?
ataturk 8y ago
Why? Because they still "work" in NY State but live elsewhere? I mean, for me, it was simple as pie--in 1997, I moved the hell out, brought all my shit in UHaul down to North Carolina, filled out an income tax form the following year, and then I was fucking done with NY State forever. Granted I wasn't still trying to earn income there. I changed all my bank accounts and everything. I love Upstate NY geographically, but I hate the government there with a passion. Bunch of idiots. I also hate NYC for imposing its will on the rest of the people in that state.
FireBeyond 8y ago
Yeah, exactly. "Spending a day or two a month in a Florida vacation home" is not "uprooting your lives".

Right, what's hard is faking it, or moving just partially.

Yes, tax collectors are just checking if you really moved or not. So if you really move, then you will have (almost) no problems.

praffer 8y ago
I wouldn't say "no problems." I've been through a New York State residency audit and it was protracted, stressful, intrusive, and expensive (for representation -- worth every penny), even though I had indeed really moved (long before the audit and not specifically for tax reasons), had loads of evidence to that effect, and was confident I would prevail in the end. (I did.) It was very unpleasant having it hanging over me for the better part of a year and I definitely thought of it as a major problem, perhaps the major problem in my life at the time, until it was resolved.
- tomohawk 8y ago
  This definitely gives me pause when considering moving to a high tax state like NY. It sounds like the kind of state where you pay your taxes and just hope the government leaves you alone, which is likely untrue if you are or become a high earner. This kind of stuff will likely be litigated for years, especially as people with means are being harassed in this way. It will be interesting to see which of these tactics ultimately pass muster. I wonder if you could bring a RICO suite.
  - radicaldreamer 8y ago
    You're buying into a lot of FUD here, there are more high earners in New York and California than many other states and very few have the kinds of problems you're describing.
    - wernercd 8y ago
      But with pushes to enact higher and higher and higher taxes specifically TARGETING higher earners... the problem is something that will become more pronounced as those higher taxes will drive more away. Whether we are talking tens... or tens of hundreds... it's still nice to know about a minefield as you work to escape from it.
      - throwaway5752 8y ago
        "But with pushes to enact higher and higher and higher taxes specifically TARGETING higher earners... the problem is something that will become more pronounced as those higher taxes will drive more away." Which pushes, can you cite a few or a trend where the distribution of tax load is shifting? Isn't NYS trying like crazy to lower higher income bracket taxes because the Federal deduction for property taxes was decreased?
    - tomohawk 8y ago
      People being harassed because they moved out of state is not FUD. Its abuse, and it definitely happens. Why would I move to a state and have a career there if I know at the end of my career I'll be at peak earnings and at that time want to move elsewhere for retirement or pre-retirement? Many people in my state move at that time to other states for tax reasons or cost of living reasons. They know they won't be able to afford to live in the high priced state when their earnings drop. I know of at least one person who's in the process of moving to FL, and they received legal advice to save all receipts and other evidence. The only reason they received this advice is due to the widespread abuse by the state. Not a NYer, but I
  - dsfyu404ed 8y ago
    >It sounds like the kind of state where you pay your taxes and just hope the government leaves you alone, That has much more to due with how the people and the government believe government should act than it does with the taxes themselves. ME and VT are fairly high tax but politicians would be hanging from bridges (edit: it should be obvious that this is an exaggeration) if the ME or VT government tried to behave like the NY or MA government because the people simply don't see that sort of government style as how things should be and the government is a large organization made up of people.
phil21 8y ago
Yeah I thought this too until I ran afoul of things. Right before SoL expired my old state said I owed them for 3 years of taxes going back 5 years previous. At that point I no longer had much documented proof I had really (legitimately) moved - since I had moved back to original state by then. Sworn statements from employers/colleagues/etc. weren't enough, and to fight it would have cost more than the amount "due". In the end I paid it, with the state tax representative even outright stating "I might even believe you, but it's going to cost you more to fight us in court over it than just paying". And right he was. I learned some lessons about record keeping - but the fact I needed to "prove my innocence" vs. the other way around was absurd.
- throwaway5752 8y ago
  Didn't you pay rent/have a landlord, forward your address, or pay utilities/taxes in your new state? Sworn statements are next to useless, but how did you manage to get into a place where you couldn't produce those types of records? I moved between states (for a bonus, moving out of a notoriously high tax state) and never had a thousandth of the issues you describe.
  - thedufer 8y ago
    None of those are considered evidence that you've lost state residency (otherwise a second home would be sufficient for New Yorkers to avoid taxes). I'm currently preparing to move out of New York temporarily, and the advice from my tax advisor is to use a credit card or make a call from a cell phone at least every 3 days, and hold on to the credit card statements/cell phone records. The odds that I will be audited upon returning seem to be somewhere north of 90%, and New York is of the opinion that you are a resident unless you can prove otherwise.
    - gamblor956 8y ago
      What your tax advisor suggested is even less relevant than a apartment rental agreement, as you can make calls and use credit cards on vacation... What is evidence of change of residency is change of voter registration and acquiring a driver's license in your new state of residence. Coupled with proof of a non-New York address, it shifts the burden to NY to prove that you are no longer one of their residents.

latch 8y ago

Except if you do legitimately move, it seems like you'd still be subject to fairly invasive scrutiny (credit card statements, phone transaction, ...) The original title is accurate, it appears hard whether you do it legitimately or not.

throwaway5752 8y ago
Why is that bad? Why should legit NYS taxpayers subsidizer free-riders? I hope they scrutinize relocations.
- njarboe 8y ago
  The government should not mess with people without probable cause?
  - UncleEntity 8y ago
    Apparently data mining is probable cause. I'm kind of curious how much data they're mining though, obviously they need fine-grained details to figure out someone is spending too much time in the state to have "renounced" their citizenship so they must have at least individual credit card transactions and (possibly) cell phone location data.

WalterGR 8y ago

FTA: “Taxes are generally subject to a three-year statute of limitations from when a return is filed, but taxpayers who start spending more time in New York even years after they’ve made a move -- like around the birth of a grandchild -- may come to auditors’ attention and be forced to provide evidence of a move that happened a decade or more in the past.”

compsciphd 8y ago
even with that, wouldn't they only be able to go back 3 years?

ataturk 8y ago

Why? Because they still "work" in NY State but live elsewhere? I mean, for me, it was simple as pie--in 1997, I moved the hell out, brought all my shit in UHaul down to North Carolina, filled out an income tax form the following year, and then I was fucking done with NY State forever. Granted I wasn't still trying to earn income there. I changed all my bank accounts and everything. I love Upstate NY geographically, but I hate the government there with a passion. Bunch of idiots. I also hate NYC for imposing its will on the rest of the people in that state.

FireBeyond 8y ago

Yeah, exactly. "Spending a day or two a month in a Florida vacation home" is not "uprooting your lives".