Canadian non-resident tax status

I'm thinking of moving to London and while I don't I should have any visa issues as my employer will be taking care of that, I'm rather unclear as to whether I should become a non-resident for Canadian tax purposes.

Given tax rates are higher in the UK than in Canada and that Canada & the UK have a tax treaty so I'm assuming any UK tax paid would provide me offsetting Canadian tax credits to some extent plus the hassle of becoming non-resident in Canada (eg close bank accounts, cancel credit cards, sell car, cancel health card & driver license, etc), does it really make any sense to do so, especially if I think I'll only be in the UK for 2-4 years?

I'm just wondering if I am missing anything.

By treaty and Cdn regs, you have no choice. Once you live and work in UK, you are UK resident by treay, Canada literally pushes you out.

You don't need to sell or cancel anything, but you medical and DL are invalidated anyways and you were going to sell you car anyways, right?

By treaty and Cdn regs, you have no choice. Once you live and work in UK, you are UK resident by treay, Canada literally pushes you out.

You don't need to sell or cancel anything, but you medical and DL are invalidated anyways and you were going to sell you car anyways, right?

Alright, just one more thing. What if I retain my dwelling that I own and pay a mortgage on? Would that affect your view? Sorry, should have mentioned that as it's a significant tie to Canada. Thanks in advance.

If you retain a dwelling, car, bank account, visa card, etc. in Canada, the CRA views you as a Resident of Canada for Tax purposes.

The only way to become a non-resident is cut every single tie to Canada.

lynz, this is incorrect. Beacuse of treaties, merely having more ties in another country is sufficient to break Cdn residency. the treaty overrides CRA regs.

I'm just getting my info straight from the CRA website.

http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/E/pub/tg/t4131/t4131-10e.pdf
http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/tx/nnrsdnts/cm ... y-eng.html
http://blog.taxresource.ca/living-abroa ... -resident/

I know it says that those "other ties MAY be relevant"
All of the research points to the fact that you have to literally cut anything and everything with Canada to be deemed a non-resident.

Maybe I'm reading something wrong???
Do you have a copy of that treaty?? I can't find it anywhere? I checked the HMRC website and couldn't find anything....googled it I don't know how many ways and couldn't find anything either....

Finance canada website.

No housey, no spousey, no residency.

Save yourself the trouble: you are non-resident. Why would you not want to be? And unless you called OHIP and DMV before leaving, your OHIP and DL are immediately finished, so your card is meaningless.

that doesn't seem right about the MTO automatically cancelling your DL. Your DL becomes invalid when it isn't renewed. If you lost your license automatically after leaving then how does it make sense that I have friends who moved to NZ for 6 months and came back and still had a DL? Same goes with another friend who was away travelling Singapore, Thailand, Laos and Cambodia for 4 months.....just seems a bit off.

OHIP I thought cancelled health insurance after 3 months of not living in Ontario? Or is it the 3 months to get it back if you were a previous resident of Ontario? (6 months otherwise I believe).

I agree - I'd end up paying less tax to the UK government than what I would here and with that, I'd much rather pay it to the UK than to the CRA.

You've got you info wrong on OHIP, and were wrong about tax residency, so I wouldn't be going with your gut feelings or beliefs on any of this.

You have six days to notify MTO of a change of address. So, once you move away, you've got six days to tell them you've left Ontario. They won't change your DL to a foreign address, so that effectively ends your DL. Other provinces have similar regs, esp. those with no fault insuarnce built-in to the program.
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you know, you could be a little nicer - especially for someone trying to learn and has questions about these things and yet am having a severe problem finding actual info from the Government websites. I'm sorry I question things but if you don't quesion, how do you learn?! (maybe you don't learn that way but I do).

Sorry, but it's true.

I finally did find what you were talking about with non-residency. And not from the finance department website either but it took a LOT of searching - especially with a lot of other forums where people have asked about non-residency status and have been told that it is quite difficult to actually acquire unless you cut every tie to Canada. It's actually a lot of muddled info and no place seems to have an absolute answer.

here's a situation:
I'm living at home currently so that I can make the move overseas. I am only planning on going for 1-2 years max. and then returning back to Canada. I don't want to give up my DL and when I move back, I'll have to most likely live at home until I can find something here. In a situation where my DL won't expire during that time, would it even be necessary to tell the MTO that I'm living somewhere else in the world?? It's not like I really plan to drive unless on a trip (in which case how would anyone really even know the difference? I'd have all and only Cdn documents).

haha that's probably considered fraud or something....