r2i forum

Hi
I have been reading with a lot of interest various issues and i am
coming towards the final stretches of my R2i plan.

I have been in US for close to 12 years and got my USC citizenship
and OCI. I have an MS (CS->US) and MBA from India
and work in investment industry and plan on moving to Pune India in June 2007.

This is what i have done and solicit advice from my friends and share there
point of view.

a) House/Furniture : As i am from Pune , i have 2BR appartment with a terrace in Aundh (parihar chowk). We are a family of 3 people and we will furnish it to our taste. We have bought furniture here in US (IKEA) and plan on shipping it using one of the shippers listed in discussion. As the house has been around for 4-5 years(my parents lived there) , we have phone ,gas
already there. I live in an appartment here in US and will extend my lease depending on my departure date. I plan on taking my Onkyo Home theatre system to India and PANSANONIC PLASMA TV (thanks to this forum in helping me with that). I have confirmed that i will get the convertors in India, so i plan on taking most of my electronic stuff (kitchen accessories , cameras,PC etc). I also have a Vonage line which i plan on taking back with me.

b) School : My son is currently in 2'nd grade and we have shortlisted these 3 schools :
i) DAV School ii) City International School iii) Loyala School.
The first 2 schools are CBSE and 3rd is SSC curriculam. We might go with
City International School as there is a possibility of confirmed admission
We have told his school in US that we will be leaving around mid-May.
What are the documents that are needed from the US schools.
We had bought Hindi Books for 3rd grade CBSE and Hindi is not Latin to him.

c) US taxation : Though my family is leaving around mid-May , i plan on leaving US in early July to claim my resident for taxation purposes(>180 days).
Am i doing the right thing from US and Indian taxation point of view ?

d) Banks/401K : I plan on consolidating all my banks to one bank which is accesible from US and similarly with my 401K. I will roll all of the 401K into Vangaurd IRA and read in some posts that Bank of America & Vangaurd can work with international addresses(i plan on using these).

e) Job: This is the area where i am least sure of. I have posted in all the sites
but with not much success. The only thing is i get a lot of emails about positions in Muscat , Singapore. I have decided still to go ahead and take a plunge into Pune. I have shortlisted some companies who are based in Pune and would need somebody with my profile and trying to reach them thru my contacts in Pune.


So let me know if i have missed something or should do something differently.

Thanks

Congrats! Good luck with the move. Please keep us posted on the job front.

... got my USC citizenship ...c) US taxation : Though my family is leaving around mid-May , i plan on leaving US in early July to claim my resident for taxation purposes(>180 days). Am i doing the right thing from US and Indian taxation point of view ?

As USC, you are US resident for US tax purposes, even if you live outside US for 365 days of a year. If the only reason for staying after family leaves is because you think that is how you can claim to be US resident for 2007, that is not necessary.

As far as India tax residential status is concerned, you will be resident in the Indian financial year April 1 2007 to March 31, 2008 regardless of whether you reach India in May or July 2007. A resident can be RNOR or ROR and how long you enjoy RNOR status may be affected by date of return, since RNOR status also depends on how many days you have spent in India in the past few years. If you want to know for sure, either use the RNOR calculator in the old MSN forum (am not sure if it has been moved here) or post Indian financial yearwise (Indian financial year runs April 1 to March 31) details of number of days spent in India, as follows:

April 1,1999 to March 31, 2000: Number of days spent in India

April 1, 2000 to March 31, 2001: Number of days spent in India

and so on until

April 1, 2006 to March 31, 2007: Number of days spent in India

Link to the RNOR calculator. Not sure whether it is uptodate.

http://www.msnusers.com/R2INRIFinanceAndInvestments/Documents/Members%20doc/RNOR%20Status%20Calc%20v2%2Exls

If you do NOT live in the US for 183 days, then you are exempt for the first $80k or so from US taxes. Since you don't have income in India, you may have to leave earlier than that to avoid US federal and state taxes.

In effect you may be making things worse for you depending on what your current income level is and the expected income in India both from local sources and US sources.

There are lots of info on the financial forum.

If you do NOT live in the US for 183 days, then you are exempt for the first $80k or so from US taxes. Since you don't have income in India, you may have to leave earlier than that to avoid US federal and state taxes. In effect you may be making things worse for you depending on what your current income level is and the expected income in India both from local sources and US sources.

OP is USC - so I am afraid I do not understand what you are trying to convey above.

The $80K or thereabouts exclusion is in respect of foreign (here India) earned (salary) income, and that exclusion is available regardless of when OP returns since OP can meet the physical presence test.

Regarding exemption from US taxes on US source income - frankly I dont know what you are talking about.

Thanks Bobus for the clarification.The decision for staying behind has some professional reasons and plus i have nothing in hand in India.


The spreadhseet shows that i can have 3 years on RNOR.

Hi Friends
Wanted to update events in the last couple of months regarding R2i.
Our situation is that i am still in US wrapping things up and my wife and son are in Pune. We did an Europe trip (10 days) in Mayend
and i came back to US.

a) House/Furniture : Our stuff has been shipped from Boston and currently in Transit and expected around July end in Bombay.
We used worldwide shipping. The packing was efficiently done and it took just 2.5 hours as we had done the initial packing.
The stuff we thought would leave ample container space turned out to be 10% more after palletization.
My advice with hindsight : only take what you need if you are paying it yourself.Will update with my experience at the other end
as well (in Aug)


b) School :My son has started his school in Pune and is adjusting to the environment. He is doing well except for some cultural aspects.
e.g. If somebody pushes you in India , you need not provide just say this is wrong. You need to give some of the same medicine.
The teachers and staff seem to be nice and have experience dealing with people in our situation



d) Banks/401K : I have connected my US accounts to ICICI money2india but i am just worried that after going to india my accounts are not
supposed to be NRE anymore. Can i make changes there ? Any exp

e) Job: I am trying to get some work from US to transition out but not sure if i can get it. Based on feedback from various sources
getting job/work there should not be a problem.


f) Broadband in India: I am trying to get BSNL connection in Aundh(i do not have choices as our society has not allowed others)
and it seems they have 3 months waiting. So this is the first frustration , all the talk about internet availability is such b***t
We have applied for a broadband and hopefully we will get it.


Please feel to ask any questions

Thanks

One question I had was on an average how much does school cost per year in Pune?

Also which model of the Panasonic have you bought and how is that working out in Pune ?

I plan to R2I to Pune in a couple of years.

22K per annum is fees
12K is some sort of deposite