Nowhere to hide

There is nothing inherently illegal in a UK resident holding an offshore bank account, a property, trust or company. As some of the estimated 1.5 million UK citizens owning foreign property have found, there can be complications with local tax authorities, and countries with large numbers of non-residents owning second homes are now actively engaged in collecting property taxes. Many EU countries (France and Spain, for instance) charge an annual income tax based on the rental value of properties owned by non-residents of that country, and some impose wealth taxes on the value of other ass...