earlyretirement
Moderator
All good information. Most locals don't pay annual asset tax on their properties. Most locals break the law. Most locals are operating in black in some way, shape or form. You get no annual property tax statement in the mail like the USA. It is your obligation to hire an accountant. Just be careful. My close friends in Argentina that own 20 apartments DO pay their asset taxes on all their properties in Argentina. She is an accountant and tells me the penalties and interest for not paying are massive. She has people that have gotten audited and have to pay huge back taxes and penalties.I believe the old forum said most people weren't paying annual asset taxes as well and IIRC sounded like it was easy to avoid, but like you said sounds like there's penalties at some point for not paying.
I wonder if even though your friend wasn't collecting rent, the fact he had a friend staying there, AFIP used it against him. I recall somewhere, somebody said they check the light bills and can use that to say whether somebody was occupying the place or not. Somebody more knowledgeable may be able to confirm or dismiss this.
HOAs seem to be all over the place, the other day I was on zonaprop and saw a place about the same size as mine w a 400k listed expensas going for 150k USD for the unit.
I haven't paid any income tax in Argentina and my property manager has been deducting annual property tax which as Piranha mentioned above has been about 1%. No word on the deed yet either.
Just remember as a non-resident foreigner you have to have a local as your local tax substitute so keep that in mind. You can't just do it on your own. So talk to a good accountant. Also, up until Milei, you had to get a special permit when you sold if you didn't have a DNI and part of that process was making sure you paid rental taxes and annual asset taxes. Milei got rid of that but you never know when it will come back.
So always good to talk to an accountant.