Identify and reuse Quantity surveyor for an ex-DHA property (Melb)?

Discussion in 'Accounting & Tax' started by obiuquido144, 20th Aug, 2018.

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  1. obiuquido144

    obiuquido144 Well-Known Member

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    Does Defense Housing (DHA) tend to use the same quantity surveyor for all properties in a state?

    I have a Melbourne property built in 1995 that was managed by DHA for 20 years. The previous owner is an elderly gentleman with not much insight, recently changed accountants etc., so not easy to get a Div 43 notice per ITAA 1936 SECT 262A (4AJA). Selling agent suggests to try to talk to DHA first.

    Has anyone here managed to successfully get historical Div 43 or even Div 40 data from the DHA?
    It feels like talking to a gov agency could be a long journey with an uncertain outcome.

    Perhaps the DHA tends to stick to one QS company in Melbourne, and I could just approach the QS directly?
    And if I managed to identify the QS company who did the depreciation reports for this property, would they be able to re-use the existing data?

    Is there even much value/savings in trying to get the older capital works and P&E depreciation data vs. just starting from scratch using estimates? I assume the surveyors have seen everything and would be very accurate in estimating the age and cost of things? On the other hand having an older report would surely speed things up and save costs?
     
    Last edited: 20th Aug, 2018
  2. Paul@PAS

    Paul@PAS Tax, Accounting + SMSF + All things Property Tax Business Plus Member

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    Tax laws changed on 9th May 2017 and it may not matter as the old report is now tainted by laws that mean you cant claim some of those costs and its prob out of date for CGT issues too. A revised QS report may assist as it would identify items changed in the past 20 years.

    Speak to a QS like Depreciator,. Washington Brown or BMT (They may well have done the original report?)
     
  3. obiuquido144

    obiuquido144 Well-Known Member

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    I bought the property in 2016 so the used P&E should still be depreciable.
    I believe there were no other substantial changes, please correct me if I'm wrong.

    @BMT Tax Depreciation @Depreciator
    If you did an old report for a property, would you be able to tell the new owner and reuse the data as reference?

    In my example, there were extensive landscaping/garden lights/irrigation works done in 2012 - it would be good to see the original cost for that as it's probably not the easiest/safest to estimate (incl. design cost etc.).
     
    Last edited: 21st Aug, 2018
  4. Depreciator

    Depreciator Well-Known Member

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    Yep. We have often done Dep Schedules for subsequent owners. Having done an initial Schedule usually means subsequent ones are cheaper because some of the work has already been done.
    DHA would know exactly what was spent on the 2012 works - and any other works - but they are not very responsive.
    Scott
     
  5. BMT Tax Depreciation

    BMT Tax Depreciation Chris Business Member

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    It would depend on when the previous schedule was compiled. If it was recently, maybe. We could then be reasonably sure that it was an accurate reflection of the current state of the property. If it was done a while ago, in particular before the upgrades to the property, probably not. As Scott suggests, other sources can be unreliable.