Sorry…

Right, yes, this looks a sensible reform of a previously very arbitrary and market skewing tax.

On a £500,000 property, the Stamp Duty would currently be £15,000 (3% of £500,000). However, from 1 April 2015, the LBTT figure for a purchaser will be £27,300 (0% up to £135,000, 2% of the portion between £135,000 and £250,000, plus 10% of the part between £250,000 and £500,000). Then that extra 50k will cost 5k more in tax rather 1.5k. I used an actual calculator.

Stealth edit there north wind.

Yup, Brodies calculator is completely wrong from £500K up 😆 But, point stands, you gave a lower value than you’re actually planning to spend.

I don’t want to worry anyone… but I am sure I heard that purchases that were already in process would be taxed on the old system!
Should come in handy for me though – we haven’t got to the point of offering as yet, and it should help selling the current house too

It says the new deal goes into play for all from tonight. You can decide to use the old or new system if you are mid purchase.

I’ll be using new and using the £1000 I save on a sofa for the new house.

Would have saved us £660 5 weeks ago.. I was fuming until I spoke to a friend who would’ve saved £4k under the new rules and it was only a week ago. Safe to say he is ******* raging. I think I’d probably be sick!

At least that puts paid to the idea that this is the most RW government ever!

500k? In Scotland? Which half of the country are you buying? 😀

Yep, nothing at all to be criticised in tax cuts for people who can afford expensive houses, and benefit cuts for people who can’t.

Oh hey, if you buy an average value house, this saves you £650. If you buy a house costing 3 times as much, it saves you £4900. That seems totally reasonable too.

More like benefit cut for those not entitled and raising the personal tax alliwance to take thousands of the lowest paid people out of tax altogether wether they were claiming benefits before or not. I like the way some people like to cherry pick the headline grabbing bits of policy change and conveniently forget the bits that don’t support their own views.

Yep, nothing at all to be criticised in tax cuts for people who can afford expensive houses

Yet in your own post you then go on to say that it benefits someone buying an average house by £650 – which is not to be sniffed at. And while some people buying houses for more than that will benefit more, some others will also pay more in tax.

I’m in the process of buying a place myself and will save a couple of grand – and while the house I’m buying is above the UK average it’s less than the average here in London.

Had a £300,000 house on the market for ages up here in sunny West Yorkshire. That means £5000 stamp duty now against £9000 before. Let’s see if it makes any difference. Sadly, though, I paid £12000 stamp duty on the house I bought last year!

I believe it used to be that the “mansions” in London were bought by the owners’ companies so they avoided taxation – has this been stopped too (or did I imagine it anyway) ?

I believe it used to be that the “mansions” in London were bought by the owners’ companies so they avoided taxation – has this been stopped too (or did I imagine it anyway) ?

There was already a punitive 15% tax rate in place for that, for residential properties over £500K bought by companies.

wobbliscott – Member

More like benefit cut for those not entitled

Real terms benefit cuts for all working age benefits- is nobody of working age entitled, in your view? The headline grabbers are designed to make us think it’s all immigrants and fraud. (there are a few cases where separate measures have countered the freeze, in fairness- childcare being the main example)

epicsteve – Member

Yet in your own post you then go on to say that it benefits someone buying an average house by £650 – which is not to be sniffed at.

And neither am I sniffing at that- though the reality is, give it a little time and house prices will just swallow the “saving”, which’ll further inflate the housing market and make homeowning unobtainable for more people. But giving a 7 and a half times bigger discount to someone who can afford 3 times as much and calling it fair is very sniffy.

And once the market corrects itself, every taxpayer ends up paying for this via the tax loss, and the only lasting result will be higher houseprices.

Anyone seen a cost breakdown, out of curiosity? Intrigued to see how much of the expense of this “fair” measure is going to go to the above-average housebuyers.

Savings in tax will be on house prices by the end of the week, 1.8 billion out of public funds and into housing equity.

‘Fair measure’? London pays more stamp duty than Wales and Scotland combined but doesn’t see the benefit as the needy regions suck it up.

Intrigued to see how much of the expense of this “fair” measure is going to go to the above-average housebuyers.

which works out as a tax cut of £4,500 when buying an average £275,000 family home.

He also claimed that only homes that cost just over £937,000 will see their stamp duty bill go up under this system.
Not sure what % of house are sold at over £937k but i will go for not many 10% ?? possibly not even that.
I would further surmise than anyone buying a house, let alone at the average price, is already better off as poorer people are excluded from the market completely. I would guess about 75% are “better off” than “average”* then. ie we have helped out the wealthy invest in wealth creating. I suspect its pretty handy for buy to let as well which is, very often, paid by the state in the form of housing benefit.

* the actual average in wealth terms of everyone and not the actual average of the wealthy buying more assets

Sorry, I phrased that badly- what I meant was, how much of the £.8 billion quid that it’s going to cost, will go to average housebuyers saving £600, and how much of it will go to above average housebuyers saving more.

I think the real beneficiaries of this are not the folk buying but those selling, especially at the £250k and £500k levels, as there aren’t those steps in there anymore. We marketed/sold a few years ago at £250k when we could’ve marketed/sold at probably £265k based upon the houses selling for +£250k.

Cool so more prices rises just what our housing market needs and especially that there London.

@NW no idea then but not as bad as the question i answered

‘Fair measure’? London pays more stamp duty than Wales and Scotland combined but doesn’t see the benefit as the needy regions suck it up.

I’ll let you google the population of London and then you can let us know just how mindblowing that little tit bit you provided is.

The economic recovery is based upon property and rent. Wages have stagnated which is why tax receipts are lower than expected. So Gideons solution?

Throw a tax cut to house buyers where the wealth is already concentrated.

It’s a good change, shame for those who just missed out on benefiting but always happens that way. Wondering what impact it will have on properties over £1m, for those with properties at that level but more modest incomes stamp duty can be a year’s + income which is hard to justify.

I think the real beneficiaries of this are not the folk buying but those selling, especially at the £250k and £500k levels, as there aren’t those steps in there anymore

I agree. We bought at £250k last year. House was marketed at £265k but no one was ever going to pay the extra stamp duty even though it is a bit bigger than other similar properties also selling for £250k at the time. We’ll now see the realisation from that 🙂

There’s more than a few commentators suggesting this will push prices up as buyers think they have a little more money to spend, and sellers think ‘oh, buyers have a little more spare cash’.

Adding more money into a market which has been blown out of all proportion from loose lending (oversupply of money), which also means a lower tax take when the tax take is already too low, is the gesture of either a complete economic idiot or an electioneeering politician desperate for voters to feel good at a time of static living standards and very low economic growth.

I’ll leave it up to you to decide. All you need to know is that house price growth remained stalled again in November…

There’s more than a few commentators suggesting this will push prices up as buyers think they have a little more money to spend, and sellers think ‘oh, buyers have a little more spare cash’.

Yep, heard this today too – either they read my earlier comment or they’ve all finally actually started to think rather than just quote GO.

500k? In Scotland? Which half of the country are you buying?

About 3 square inches of prime aberdeen realestate i reckon