Wife selling some of her jewellery - concerned about salary taxes?

[mentalnap]

Hello all!

Recently my wife "inherited" (see: took before the rest of her family could get their grubby hands on them. dysfunctional families will understand! :roll ) her mum's jewellery collection. There's a lot there, and we're looking to scale it down a lot. We're planning to get the important bits and sell the less important ones, and put that towards the deposit on our new house. However, she will be selling them and she's getting a bit concerned about the money from them being taxed in some way. Is that something we should be worrying about? I've looked at this salary calculator online - income-tax.co.uk - and neither of us are particularly close to the next tax band (40% in the UK) so I'm not sure what she's worrying about. Is there any tax/fees/anything relating to sales on jewellery that we should be aware of?

Thanks!

 

[OoohShiny]

Assuming this isn't spam for your income tax website...

... I don't believe one-off sales of personal goods incurs income tax liability. If it did, everyone on ebay would have liabilities.

You should look at the HMRC website for guidance.

 

[Bron357]

Technically speaking possibly yes, but the reality is that 99.99% of people selling excess jewellery don’t pay any tax even if some was payable.
Unless you’re talking tens of thousands of pounds (and I hope in that case the other family members won’t lodge a counter legal suit to get their share) who would know and who would care.
I would seek appropriate tax advice and possibly legal advice is there is likely to be a family dispute arising once the other family members realize your wife has “the good aka valuable stuff”.

 

[Maisie]

When my nana died my auntie took all of her jewellery. It broke my mother’s heart that she didn’t leave her even a small item to wear in remembrance. I hear you on the dysfunctional thing but I hope there aren’t siblings of your wife that might feel the same way.

 

[BlingDreams]

Since you’ve taken what you want, why not let other family members have some too? Especially since you see the pieces as unimportant (except for you wallet, that is).

 

[cmd2014]

I suspect the bigger issue would be estate/inheritance tax rather than income tax. Well, that and the moral/potential legal issue of taking something valuable (and sentimental) that should be shared with siblings if there are any. This is why people need to have wills and to appoint trustworthy executors, so that family members don’t steal from each other. I would be devastated if my sister did this to me.