Gift to new spouse - gift tax due? Form 709?

[rf78801]

Hello and thanks for any advice you can offer.  

Newly married in a community property state but with a pre-marital agreement which nullified the community property laws.  Provided ~$100K directly to my new spouse (defined as a gift under our PMA) so she could pay off her debt and we could start with a blank slate.  Trying to determine if I have incurred an IRS gift tax by doing this (and whether I need to file IRS Form 709).  Called the IRS only to be told that they don't provide taxpayer assistance on gift taxes and to "contact a tax professional".  Unbelievable.  Anyway, then contacted TurboTax assistance only to be told that form 709 isn't included in TurboTax and therefore no assistance is available.  Can't believe this is such an exotic question!  Advice anyone?

[Vanessa A]

Your state laws and your Premarital agreement may make this different, but no, you should not have to pay a gift tax for one of two reasons.

1) When transferring between spouses, it is not considered a gift

2) The annual exclusion for 2022 is $16,000, then on top of that you have a lifetime exclusion of $11.7 million.  So, unless you have already used most of your lifetime exclusion, then you would not need to pay taxes on this gift.

You will however, need to file form 709 since it is over the annual limit to show you are using up part of your lifetime limit.  That is, IF, this does NOT count as a transfer between spouses. 

[M-MTax]

Yeah, THIS IS a transfer between spouses and no gift tax return is required.....especially since it's cash and not some sort of terminable interest. A pre-nup is not material for federal gift tax purposes.