Conveyancers have told George Osborne that he should scrap or water down his Stamp Duty Land Tax proposals.
Osborne is due to reveal the final detail on these in next week’s Budget – giving conveyancers only nine working days in which to implement the changes on April 1.
Yesterday, on Twitter, Stephen Hayter of My Home Move used the hashtag ‘madness’ to describe the timescale.
Now the Conveyancing Assocation has called on Osborne to favour stability over continual change when it comes to the housing and mortgage markets.
The Conveyancing Association says there has been a spike in buy-to-let transactions which has stretched all parties and “placed an unnecessary burden on conveyancers to meet an artificial deadline”.
It also claims there is a large degree of arbitrariness to key points, such as exemption given to larger landlords buying 15 properties in one deal.
Eddie Goldsmith, chairman of the Conveyancing Association, said: “Unsurprisingly, the conveyancing market is looking for a period of stability but I suspect we won’t be getting that post-next week’s Budget.
“The publication of the final rules for extra Stamp Duty charges on additional properties will be made available and one can’t help think there is likely to be some considerable confusion around them, not forgetting that the conveyancing industry will have to cope with these changes from the start of April.
“The small amount of time this provides firms to ready themselves and to ensure all stakeholders in the market are clear on these new rules is, quite frankly, ludicrous.
“Not only would we like to see these additional Stamp Duty charges dropped, or at the very least watered down but we feel any further change in the UK housing market, unless positively focused on areas like helping to increase property supply or supporting first-time buyers, will only add to the instability we (and many others) will have to cope with.
“We believe the Chancellor should allow the market time to breathe – in our view, it is much better served by supporting steady transaction numbers, rather than the artificially-created spikes that have been far too prevalent.
“The last three months of increased buy-to-let transactions have been a case in point.
“Instead, we would like to see the status quo post-April maintained and allow us to plan and prepare our resources adequately based on the market itself rather than deal with further uncertainty generated by ongoing intervention.”
The situation is becoming more and more complicated and risky. If a fixed completion of 31st March is delayed for any reason, the buyer could end up paying the additional 3%, through no fault of their own. I can see that there will be a significant number of simultaneous exchanges and completions taking place.
In addition, some lenders have extended the time to request the mortgage advance from seven working days to ten. That means that requests will need to be made on or before the 15th March. One day before the budget, and before we all know the final position with regard to the additional SDLT charge. To add more confusion and difficulty, conveyancers should not really be submitting their requests for the mortgage advance until contracts have been exchanged. It’s a no win, no win situation.
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Yet another bit of silly pretty boy legislation. In fact I am old enough to remember a similar blunder by Nigel Lawson back in 1988 when he gave several months’ advance notice of the removal of joint mortgage interest relief.
Following that, there was the most almighty surge of panic buying to beat the deadline, and most of us know what happened to the property market after the winter of 1988, although other factors were to blame.
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I too, am old enough to remember 1988, Lawson gave 5 months notice which helped create the terrible crash and decent people wanting a home for their families just giving back their keys and walking away.
So 5 months notice and the chancellor was damned then and a short mediation period and even shorter rubber stamping period and he is damned now! I don’t agree with it as this has blown apart my retirement plans but there has to be some common sense and common ground that the chancellor and the multiple industries that this affects can find but alas he gives us all no time to find it, or will he relent and perhaps water it down or delay till next year, NAH!!
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We have as much chance of being heard as a f*rt in thunderstorm.
Same thing happened with the renewable incentive the ‘Feed in Tariff’ changes and the Green Deal measures, trashed a lot of businesses and created huge uncertainty about investing. Basically it is all down to politics not common sense; dont worry about the little people but keep the big investors (potential donors) happy.
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I get the feeling Osborne is “the blind leading the deaf” over a cliff. He is stumbling over his own shoe laces trying to help everyone but in fact wreaking havoc wherever he goes.
Mr Osborne please do not meddle in things you do not understand. The property market is over heated yes, but forcing 3% surcharge on small landlords is utterly stupid and worse not charging 3% on institutional landlords buying 15+ units is utterly ridiculous.
If you want to help the property market why don’t you reinvest taxes in underperforming areas like the South East Welsh Valleys, Ebbw Vale, create more employment there, improve peoples lives in poverty stricken areas will attract businesses, landlords, home buyers and generate employment for tens of thousands. Restrict the amount Landlords can borrow on BTL mortgages over £200,000 purchase price will dampen down overheated areas like London. If the Landlord is cash then it’s fine, house prices can go either way so they risk their cash the same way as buying shares.
Sorry was this a little too obvious Mr Osborne ?
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Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
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This is hardly an “artificial” deadline. It is just a deadline – a very real one, in fact. Personally, I have little sympathy for the whingeing of these greedy B2L vultures – or those who feed off them. It was a mistake to allow any period of grace at all. They were bound to take advantage of it by trying to snaffle as much property as they could and effectively remove it from the ordinary sales market (thereby, of course, further exacerbating the gap between supply and demand, and – surprise, surprise – driving rents even higher).
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Therein lies the problem. Mr Osborne’s ‘madness’ will make it even more difficult for the very people his misguided intentions were designed to help by causing an increase in rents.
As with any increase in costs someone has got to foot the bill and invariably it is the end user that ends up paying for it.
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Fencesitter. Greedy BTL, how very imaginative of you. Despite Countrywide’s recent report that showed nationally only 36% of investor purchases were subject to an offer from an owner occupier. You still wish to perpetrate the myth that its greedy BTL landlords that are responsible for the supply demand imbalance. It couldn’t be 40 years of failure by successive governments to build enough houses. No, lets blame BTL. The Chancellor shows a great slight of hand. ” Look over there, its the BTL landlords fault that FTBs can’t buy, nothing to do with me guv”
There in lies one of the problems with the property market in the UK. Too many people who don’t understand it think they do and are happy to share their lack of knowledge with those who have even less.
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So you think this is a problem? 3% will seem of little or no consequence when we have the market collapse after the Brexit.
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Newsboy perhaps you can enlighten us all with your insight as to how you think withdrawal from the EU will have a negative effect on the housing market? I would guess that like everyone, you have absolutely no clue what will happen if we leave. One thing of course is for sure, if we stay we will have much more of the same!
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The Same vs The Unknown
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my experience is in the last 18mths no ones selling ….just buying, hence short supply normal buyers letting their existing for investment and buying independently. Since the announcement of the possible 3% stamp duty I am taking on more property from buyers who can’t afford to pay the additional 3% and keep their main home to let out. It’s helped supply slightly for me
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“There in lies one of the problems with the property market in the UK. Too many people who don’t understand it think they do and are happy to share their lack of knowledge with those who have even less….” Which are you, I wonder?
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