Apr 17, 2017 | Art Bits
Here’s a conversation to have with your CPA after 2016 taxes are put to bed and she has come back from well-needed R&R. The topic is long term capital gains on the sale of art that you’ve held for one year or more. Did you know that art and collectibles are taxed at 28%, unlike long term capital gains on stocks, bonds and real estate. Add to that the health care surtax of 3.8% that applies to net investment income above a certain amount, which includes gains from the sale of art. This is a simple concept that is often overlooked by art collectors today. So much attention is paid to potential savings on estate taxes by making lifetime gifts that the basics are often overlooked. Bottom line, it’s a good idea to compare the transfer tax saving that is achieved by a lifetime gift with the cost of potential capital gains taxes that might be due. What? You don’t know your cost basis?
Dec 3, 2016 | Art Bits
One of the pleasures of the holiday season is having the time to revisit family customs and traditions. One of my favorites is going through old photo albums page by page. Celebrations are recorded in black and white and color, and old familiar faces smile back in different settings, outfits and hairdos. This year I went through the various albums starting with the oldest album first. Quite literally, as if I had a flip chart in my hand, I could see the years pass by. The same friends joined my family for the major celebrations in our lives. Marriages, graduations, birthdays were all played out through the decades. But this year, I became aware of something new. In each of those albums, the same painting showed up time after time, hovering above the heads of the faces being viewed. It was one of my parents’ first major purchases, “The Truce” by Jack Dudley. I remember the day they brought the painting home. It is of three young boys in paper hats, with toy swords, huddling together as if in serious negotiation. It hung in the den of our first home, one of the few paintings on the wall. And it hung in the living room of subsequent homes, surrounded by other pieces purchased over the years, still hovering over the heads of family and friends stopping for the random photograph to memorialize a special moment in our family’s life. The painting, like the photographs gathered over the years, is a family treasure shared with loved ones and passed down to future generations.
Special moments captured in photographs. Special works of art enduring over time. Art is legacy.
Sep 2, 2016 | Art Bits
I used to love Joan River’s signature line, “Can We Talk”. You never knew what would be the topic du jour, but you always knew that it would be fun, bold and a bit over the top. Talking about art succession won’t necessarily be “over the top”, but it is a topic of conversation that needs to take place for any one who has accumulated prized possessions over his or her lifetime. From wine and fancy cars, to figurines and 21st century art, at some point the joy of collecting will turn into the angst of not knowing what to do with all this “stuff”. Think your kids will want it? Think again! But surprisingly, so few people actually sit down with their family to discuss their prized possessions. Perhaps the first step in art succession planning is asking your kids, “Can We Talk?”
Recent Comments