Taxation on gain on sale of car

Jandhyala Hasyam (6 Points)

14 May 2016  

I am a salaried employee. My company has an employee car lease option where an employee can take a loan through a financing company. The car itself will be in company's name but monthly emi will get cut from employee's salary. I opted for a 3 year tenure car lease and bought a car for 4 lakhs. Now the 3 years are over. Now the finance company has asked me to pay residual value of 1 lakh followng which they said  i can transfer the car onto my name. It looks like what this effectively means is that i am buying the car for 1 lakh from the financer.

My question is this - I want to sell this car and have an offer from a buyer for 1.75 lakhs. Now even though i have been paying for the car from  my salary the car is actually owned by my company. So now should I pay income tax / capital gain tax on the .75 lakhs ? 

I read that car is a personal asset and there is not capital gain on it. Can this rule apply in my case ? If this rule has to apply in my case   then will i have to transfer the car to my name first and then sell it to buyer (thereby buyer will beome third owner) ? Currently it is on companies name and i and i can directly register it to the buyer (thereby buyer will be second owner which is preferred by the buyer).

 

Thanks

JH