Sale of land belonging to a land and forestry business of a public corporation

The tax regulations for Public law corporations (e.g. municipalities, churches, etc.) are sometimes characterized by high complexity. In connection with Real estate sales Among other things, the question arose as to whether and under what conditions a public-law entity could be considered a "private land sale"Pursuant to § 30 of the EStG, the person who then Property income tax subject to. A decision issued in this regard by the Supreme Administrative Court (GZ Ro 2016/15/0025 of 27.6.2018) concerned the Sale of land from a agricultural and forestry business. A special feature of public-law entities is that one agricultural and forestry enterprise not is an industrial business and therefore not subject to unlimited Tax liability It is questionable whether this is (tax-exempt) "business assets" or, from a tax perspective, "assets" as defined in the tax code."Private assets"means the property to be dealt with, which in the event of the sale of land can trigger a real estate tax.

The Supreme Administrative Court has in this regard the view represented by the BFG that the sale of land that belonged to the agricultural and forestry enterprise, no private land sales and therefore the sale is not subject to corporate tax, not shared. In its decision, the VwGH assumed that public-law entities Outside of the "fictional" tax entity of Business of a commercial nature is not taxable business assets own (or be able to) and in principle the limited tax liability are subject to. These limited tax liability has also included since 2012 Real estate sales, which cannot be attributed to any commercial activity.

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