By Saurabh Garg, founder·11 min read·Published 2026-08-25

Short answer: Which Indian mission handles your property paperwork is decided by the state you live in, not by the city you fly from. Nine missions cover the United States under a jurisdiction map revised on 15 July 2025. Your flat in India then runs on four rails: an NRO account for the rent, a narrow power of attorney for the signatures, an Indian return for the tax India already withheld, and a US return that reports the same income again and credits what India took.

India Property From the United States

The first thing to get right is not the tax. It is which Indian mission your state belongs to, because that one fact decides where your power of attorney gets attested and how long it takes. An owner in Edison sends paperwork to New York. An owner forty minutes away in Stamford sends it to New York too. An owner in Boulder sends it to San Francisco, not to the consulate two states closer. The map is not geography. It is a published jurisdiction list, and it changed on 15 July 2025.

This page is the entry point for everything a US-resident owner has to run: the mission map, the four rails, what India withholds before you see a rupee, what the IRS wants back, and the page for your city.

Which mission holds your paperwork

There are nine Indian missions in the United States: the Embassy in Washington DC and eight Consulates General. The Embassy of India lists the revised jurisdiction as effective 15 July 2025.

Mission States and territories it covers
Embassy, Washington DC District of Columbia, Kentucky, Maryland, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Bermuda
New York New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Delaware
Boston Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont
Atlanta Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina, Tennessee, Puerto Rico, US Virgin Islands
Chicago Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Wisconsin
Houston Texas, Arkansas, Kansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma
Los Angeles Ten Southern California counties, Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico
San Francisco Northern California, Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Hawaii, Guam
Seattle Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Alaska, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota

Two lines in that table trip people up. California is split: ten counties in the south sit with Los Angeles, the rest of the state with San Francisco. And Boston has jurisdiction over the five New England states on paper while its office is still being stood up, so Consulate General of India New York has been handling passport, visa and OCI work for those states, with applications lodged through VFS in Boston. Check the mission's own advisory the week you file, because that arrangement is temporary by design.

The four rails every owner builds once

An India flat run from the United States sits on four rails. Build them once and the rest is operations.

An NRO account for the money. Rent from an Indian property has to land in a Non-Resident Ordinary account in your name. That is the account that holds India-source income, and it is the account your repatriation later runs out of. Set it up before a tenant pays anything. The mechanics are in our guide on NRO accounts and rent taxation.

A narrow power of attorney for the signatures. You cannot stand in a Pune sub-registrar's office to sign a leave-and-licence agreement. A power of attorney lets one named person act for one named property. Keep it narrow: this flat, these acts, nothing else. From the US the route is four steps and a clock. Sign before a notary with two independent witnesses, apostille at your state's Secretary of State, courier the original to India, and adjudicate stamp duty within three months of the document reaching India under Section 18 of the Indian Stamp Act. If you hold an Indian passport or an OCI card you can use consulate attestation in place of the apostille. The full walkthrough is in our guide on granting a power of attorney from the USA to India.

An Indian return for the tax India already took. India taxes first and withholds at source. You file to reconcile what was withheld against what you owe, and to get the difference back.

A US return that reports the same income again. The IRS taxes citizens and resident aliens on worldwide income wherever they live. The India rent goes on your US return in dollars, and the Indian tax you paid comes back as a credit.

What India takes before the money reaches you

Rent paid to a non-resident owner carries tax at source of 31.2% from the first rupee. That is 30% base plus 4% health and education cess, and it holds while your total Indian income for the year stays under 50 lakh. There is no threshold below which it stops. A resident landlord letting the same flat at 45,000 a month has nothing withheld. You have 31.2% withheld on rupee one. The rule lived in Section 195 of the Income-tax Act 1961 and moved to Section 393(2) when the Income-tax Act 2025 took effect on 1 April 2026. The rate did not change. Our guide on rent TDS for NRI landlords has the surcharge bands and the fix.

On a sale the arithmetic is worse before it is better. The buyer withholds on the full sale price, not on your gain, at the long-term rate of 12.5% plus surcharge and cess, which works out between 13% and 14.95% depending on the value. Long-term gains on land or buildings sit at a flat 12.5% with no indexation, and the lower-of-two choice that lets a resident pay 20% with indexation does not reach non-residents. The fix for the withholding is a lower-deduction certificate, filed as Form 13, renamed Form 128 under the 2025 Act, before the sale closes. It takes three to eight weeks, so file it the day a price is agreed. See selling property in India from the USA.

What the IRS wants from the same rent

Your India rent goes on Schedule E of Form 1040, converted to dollars. One difference catches owners who have owned US rentals: a foreign residential rental is depreciated over 30 years under the alternative depreciation system, not the 27.5 years you may be used to.

The India-US treaty does not stop India taxing the property. Article 6 gives India the first right to tax the rent, and Article 13 lets each country tax capital gains under its own law. The treaty works as a credit, not a discount. You claim the Indian tax back on Form 1116. Use the Indian tax computed on your Indian return, not the raw withheld figure, because the two differ. Our guide on the India-USA treaty for property owners sets out both articles.

Two reporting forms sit on top. An NRO account is a foreign financial account, so if your foreign accounts together cross USD 10,000 at any point in the year you file an FBAR on FinCEN Form 114, due 15 April with an automatic extension to 15 October. Cross USD 50,000 at year end or USD 75,000 at any time, as a single filer living in the US, and Form 8938 goes in with your return under FATCA. Neither is extra tax. Both carry penalties if missed. Confirm your own thresholds with a US adviser, because they move with filing status and with whether you live in the US or abroad.

Getting the money to a US account

Money in an NRO account does not move on its own. The Reserve Bank of India permits up to USD 1 million per financial year out of NRO balances, sale proceeds included, once Indian tax is paid and documented. The limit covers every NRO outflow together, wires and NRO-to-NRE transfers alike, and it resets on 1 April. Unused limit lapses on 31 March, so a sale worth more than that needs two financial years to move in full. The paperwork is Form 15CA from you and Form 15CB from a chartered accountant. Details in repatriating sale proceeds from an NRO account.

Your city, your mission, your page

Each page below carries the mission that covers you, the time gap you work across, and the state tax question that applies where you live.

What we run for owners in the US

Here is the honest frame. We have no office in the United States and we are not going to pretend otherwise. Our people are in India, inside the working hours you cannot reach. Teams on the ground in Bangalore and Hyderabad, and vetted broker partners in Mumbai, Pune, Chennai and Gurgaon, which we say out loud rather than implying a national payroll.

What that means for your flat: one named manager rather than a queue, itemized billing to the rupee, dated photographs when work is done, and rent landing in your NRO account with the withholding paperwork tracked so your Indian and US filings agree with each other.

If you have never met the person watching your property, start with a Property Health Check. It is a site visit, a boundary and encroachment survey, the encumbrance certificate, khata and mutation status, tax dues and occupancy, written up as a risk report. It costs 20,000 rupees, it needs no keys and no power of attorney, and it is how you find out what you own before you hand anyone anything.

What it costs

Property Health Check at 20,000 rupees, one time. Quarterly photo proof on a vacant property, priced per property on the same page. Full management from 5% of monthly rent, minimum 2,500 rupees a month. Tenancy placement from one month's rent. The breakdown sits on our pricing page, the scope on services, and the free calculators on tools. For numbers against your own flat, ask for a proposal.

FAQ

How do I know which Indian consulate covers me? By the state you live in, under the jurisdiction list the Embassy of India published with effect from 15 July 2025. Nine missions cover the country. California is the one state split between two of them, with ten southern counties under Los Angeles and the rest under San Francisco.

Do I need an apostille or a consulate attestation for my power of attorney? Both routes work and which one is open to you depends on your documents. If you hold a US passport, the route is notarisation followed by an apostille from your state's Secretary of State. If you hold an Indian passport or an OCI card, you can have the mission attest it instead. Either way the original has to reach India and be adjudicated for stamp duty within three months of arrival.

I live in the USA. Do I pay tax twice on my India rent? No, though you do report it twice. India taxes the rent first under Article 6 of the treaty and withholds at source. You then report the same rent on Schedule E of your US return and claim a credit for the Indian tax on Form 1116. The treaty prevents the double tax; it does not reduce India's rate.

Does my NRO account create a US filing obligation? It can. An NRO account is a foreign financial account. If your foreign accounts together exceed USD 10,000 at any time in the year you file an FBAR. Larger balances add Form 8938 under FATCA. These are reporting forms, not extra tax, and the thresholds move with your filing status.

Can I sell my India flat without flying back? Yes, with a registered property-specific power of attorney and a lower-deduction certificate filed before the sale closes. Without the certificate the buyer withholds up to 14.95% of the full sale price rather than of your gain, and that cash sits with the tax department until your return is processed.

Do you have an office in the United States? No. Our people are in India. That is the point of the service: somebody who can stand in front of your flat inside the Indian working day, when you are asleep or at your desk on the wrong side of the clock.

Saurabh Garg, founder, 66 MG Road

Sources

Information on this page is as on 2026-08-25. Rules, rates, deadlines and government portals change without notice, so verify against the official source before you act. This page is for information only. It is not tax or legal advice, and it is not a substitute for a qualified adviser who knows your position.