Feel free to browse and/or download this presentation about Inheritance Taxes in the Canary Islands, which applies to Tenerife, Gran Canaria, Lanzarote and Fuerteventura.
Regional allowances are typically much more generous than those permitted by the central government, so it is vital to understand how you can benefit from them and reduce your Spanish inheritance tax liability.
Back in 2012, the government of the Canary Islands approved plans to re-establish inheritance tax, in an attempt to close a €200m gap in the government's coffers. In addition to the inheritance tax increases, increases were made to the local version of VAT - known as IGIC - and taxes paid on petrol. The measures were brought under legislation introduced in Ley 04/2012.
The re-establishment of inheritance tax was estimated to bring in between €80m and €100m per annum, while the other measure such as the increase in the IGIC rate from 5% to 7% were expected to bring in considerably less.
The government expected to increase income from inheritance tax by reducing the extent and application of exemptions. This would be achieved by, for example, by changing the exemption applied to children under the age of 18. Whereas before, such a beneficiary of an estate who was under the age of 21 would receive a blanket exemption from inheritance taxes on estates worth up to €1m this would be separated in to different ranges.
