I'm kind of surprised that Anna is bidding farewell to her candy juicy castle/chateau so soon. I thought she'd last longer than a year. Why buy a 3,500+ sq. ft. home if you're not planning on staying in it long-term? Oh well, I guess she'll turn a nice profit on it like the (ginormous) lady boss she is.
Yeah, but she'll have to pay capital gains tax on any profit she makes.
I'm not a CPA, but here's my basic understanding of it:
If you, as a single person) sell your primary residence, the first $250,000 in profit (capital gains) is excluded—you don't have to pay taxes on it. So if you buy a house for $500K and sell it for $850K, you only have to pay capital gains taxes on $100K.
However, there's a catch—you must own it, and it must be your primary residence, for at least two consecutive years out of the previous five. If you bought the house in April 2016, used it as your primary residence from then until April 2018, then moved out and let it sit vacant (or used it as a second home) until you sold it in April 2021, you're eligible for that $250,000 exclusion (here are exceptions to that, but they don't apply here).
Had Anna decided to tough it out in the 'burbs for one more year, she'd get that exclusion. Instead, she'll have to pay capital gains tax on all the profit she makes on this sale, which, IIRC, is something like 15-20%.
I don't know anything else about her finances, and again, I'm not a CPA, but just going by what that kind of decision would do in my own tax situation, it just looks dumb and impulsive. It makes me think that she wants out of that house so badly, she's willing to pay capital gains to do it as soon as possible—and that the money is not an issue for her.
And who knows? Maybe by next year the market value of the house will have gone up so much that even with the $250K exclusion she'll still be on the hook for more capital gains taxes than she will be now. That can easily happen in a hot market.
tl;dr: She will make a tidy profit on the sale, and she's been able to write off a lot of her household expenses while living there as business expenses, so it's not the worst financial decision ever. Trust me, she can afford plenty of Athleta, despite her blatant attempt to appear "relatable" by saying she can't. (Fitting into Athleta? Yeah, not so much. But she can deffo afford to buy it.)
