I got possession of my home in June 2019 and moved there on March 1, 2020. Can I claim HRA benefits for the house for rented House till February 2020 and tax benefits on home loan interest simultaneously, for the same financial year? What about the interest paid till I got possession of the house?

Priscilla

By Palluant Jean, Editor-in-Chief, ApnaPaisa

There are no restrictions on claiming simultaneous tax benefits for an HRA and a home loan for the same year.

To claim HRA benefit, you must meet the requirement that you are actually paying rent for a home that you occupy that you do not own. The HRA benefit is calculated for the period for which the rent is paid and not for the year as a whole. Therefore, you will be able to claim an HRA benefit until you pay the rent on the house.

Also, to claim interest under Section 24 (b), you must pay interest on the loan taken to purchase the property you own and own. Note that you will be able to claim interest throughout the year, as there is no provision for the proportionate interest provision in Section 24 (b). So even if you took possession of the home on the last day of the tax year, you could still claim interest for the entire year.

As for the interest paid before you got the possession, the same is allowed to be claimed in five equal installments beginning from the year in which you take the possession. The total interest claim made up of interest during the construction period, as well as for the current year, is restricted to two lakh rupees in a year for self-occupied property and the excess of interest over two lakh rupees will have to be ignored.

In the case of renting the property, full interest is allowed, but the loss is allowed under the homeownership against the other income within the limits of two lakh rupees per year and the unpaid loss from this In this way, it can be transferred and offset from the income under the heading of "income from other sources" for the next eight years. Therefore, you will be able to claim the HRA for 11 months. You will also be allowed interest for the year 2019-2020 and 1/5 of the total interest paid until March 31, 2019, within the limit of 2 lakh as this is your self-occupied property.

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