ZZP Tax Advice: Mortgage Interest Deduction Explanation

Questioner

Dear Sir/Madam I am a self-employed person, I turned over 18,000 euros in 2011. Now my accountant says that if the self-employed deduction is deducted from that 18,000, I will fall below the threshold for the tax-free allowance and therefore do not have to pay tax, but then I will also not be entitled to mortgage interest deduction, this will save me 4,000 euros per year. Is this correct?

Lawyer

Your accountant is right. The mortgage interest deduction is not an amount that you receive from the tax authorities. With mortgage interest deduction, you are given the opportunity to deduct the paid mortgage interest from your taxable income, which means that you have to pay less income tax. An employee already has (wage) tax withheld from his salary every month. At the end of the year, he has already paid a lot of tax in this way. If an employee has a mortgage, he often receives a refund from the tax authorities because you have paid too much (wage) tax. But as a self-employed person, you do not pay wage tax. And if you have too little income, you do not have to pay income tax either. The mortgage interest cannot therefore be deducted from the tax. So you do not receive €4,000. However, you may have a negative income and you can deduct that from the tax in the future.