The Greater Norristown Corporation, in conjunction with the Norristown  Chamber of Commerce and the municipality of Norristown hosted a discussion on Qualified Opportunity Zones Tuesday at the Montgomery County Intermediate Unit in Norristown.

Norristown planning department director Jayne Musonye presented welcoming remarks and introduced the guest speaker, Stanley J. Kull from Saul Ewing Arstein & Lehr.

While Kull readily admitted there were still many unanswered questions about Qualified Opportunity Zones, the tone of the presentation was completely positive for the dozens of investors in the room.

Anyone who has realized a capital gain from the sale of property to an unrelated person can obtain substaintial tax benefits by investing in a Qualified Opportunity Fund within 180 days of realizing the gain, according to a handout offered at the presentation. The fund must then invest in property in a Qualified Opportunity Zone. The potential tax benefits of such a move include defferal of the taxpayer’s original capital gain, elimination of up to 15 percent of the deferred gain and elimination of gain from the sale of the investment in the fund. If the investment in the fund is held  by  the taxpayer for 10 years, any gain from the sale of the fund is free from any tax.

The handout included three pages of Q&A examples, but  Kull did stress that many of the questions are still yet to be answered by the federal government.

For more information contact Kull at stanley.kull@saul.com.