One of Britain’s biggest conveyancing firms yesterday warned that the government’s failure to extend the stamp duty deadline is creating “panic” across the housing market.
Reports earlier this week claimed up to 50,000 house movers may miss out on the stamp duty holiday tax break because of delays in the system – a factor which could lead to chains collapsing.
But some experts increasingly believe that number – which were based on projections by Zoopla – could be far higher.
Yesterday Adrian Jaggard, the CEO of Taylor Rose MW, warned the system is struggling under the strain of transactions and warned those working in the sector were experiencing levels of stress and pressure they had never experienced in their careers.
He told EYE: “As house buyers and sellers consider the implications of missing the revised SDLT deadline, they are increasingly applying pressure to lawyers to try and push their transaction through.
“Aware that chains may fall down if the deadline is missed, agents are increasingly panicking. This intense cycle of additional communications only adds burden to lawyers who are already facing activity and stress and strain levels never before seen in their career.
“The end result is a fight of the fittest to try to get through as many transactions as possible. But there is no doubt chains will fall down in June and mortgage offers may be invalidated by a change in financials as a result.
“This situation once again underlines the folly of the government’s refusal to shift on the June-end cut off for SDLT.”
Whole chains could face collapse as stamp duty deadline looms – claim
Extending the deadline would help, how?
Okay – so the ones currently in chains don’t fret. But what of the next customer?
If the deadline was extended until, say, 31st August – anyone that secures a property/agrees a sale today is then going to be in a chain that they will pressure to complete by 31st August; and those that don’t would result in the same potential outcome as those that miss it this time round.
The deadline cannot continuously be extended because each time it is, you get brand new transactions fighting to complete by the new deadline. So it achieves nothing.
The tapering off system is probably the best, or, failing that, you say that anyone whose transaction is already in motion (by which I mean both vendor and purchaser have signed instruction paperwork) at the date of the deadline still gets to benefit. The government seems to trust SRA/CLC/CILEX regulated individuals so could “trust” that they wouldn’t declare transactions which do not actually fall within remit.
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no one said it had to be as long as previous extensions. Lets be honest, even if it was a few weeks or just an exchange by the end of June it would help
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Let us just keep on doing it
Everyone knew the rules
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This guy must have missed the parliamentary debate. He can scream and shout all he likes and an extension still won’t happen.
Government is going to allow all sectors to normalise after July 19 and it will soon be the time to start repairing for damage done by COVID. More tax breaks are an unrealistic dream.
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All they need to do is allow properties to have exchanged by the end of June to avoid the stamp duty as the main issue we have been having for a while now is getting removal firms for clients. So many cases are ready to complete by the end of June but without the availability of removal firms i myself have plenty of sales where clients cannot find any to move them and i am sure that is a countrywide issue.
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Haha, nonsense, no they are not.
It was a massive Government blunder for the last extension during a ‘work from home’ directive.
All the last 3 month extension did was excuse slow conveyancers from hitting 31 March, as they then went to sleep again for April and most of May and are now getting a kicking from clients and agents and suddenly springing into action and causing a massive bottleneck and chaos of pressure on the rest of us.
Right now in our inbox we have the slow lawyers springing to life – this close to 30 June. We all have a list of who they are.
The various lockdowns have shown us that the Government needs to urgently step in and regulate conveyancing quality as it is not being handled well enough by the regulatory bodies themselves, not for decades now.
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Interesting that the legal profession are asking for an extension of the Stamp Duty Holiday. In the last couple of weeks i have found key fee earners and assistants taking holidays which of course they are entitled to do, but surely at this critical time they should be putting their clients interests first and working through this time and take their holidays later in the year. In addition to this, surely it is time for Estate Agents to take action against individual solicitors who show negligence and incompetency in causing unnecessary delays in the moving process. Remember as agents we put our livelihoods and cashflow in the hands of these people and once we have agreed a sale and timeframe at the point of sale only for solicitors to work at their own pace. It should also be mentioned that most still get paid even if the sale does not go through. Let us as fellow professionals ask solicitors a timeline of their activity such as when contracts have been sent out, searches applied for and replies to enquiries raised and returned etc. They can then be accountable to not only their clients but to the Estate Agents who very often lose their fee due to the incompetency of some (not all) solicitors.
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Most of the conveyancers I know, are not asking for an extension, nor are they taking holidays yet.
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What’s a holiday?
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A publicity piece for a firm of Solicitors. A non story and I’m not sure it should even be published on here?
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Oh God, please no. I managed all of my buyers and sellers from November onwards with March in mind, have tried to do the same again. Either scrap the whole thing or stop mucking about with the market.
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those working in the sector were experiencing levels of stress and pressure they had never experienced in their careers.
My ancestors were involved in 2 world wars.
Conveyancing is not stress.
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Streaa: a state of mental or emotional strain or tension resulting from adverse or demanding circumstances. You dont have to go to war to be stressed.
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It is a job
It is not life or death
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Or, as Australian cricketer Keith Miller, (one of Bradman’s “Invincibles” and RAAF pilot during the last war) put it, when asked about pressure in cricket:
“Pressure is a Messerschmitt up your 4rse, playing cricket is not”
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exactly !
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Good grief! Welcome to the real World – “those working in the sector were experiencing levels of stress and pressure they had never experienced in their careers” – is this trying to link these snowflakes to mental health issues? Get up earler, start work earlier. Work later. The work will dry up eventually…..
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no dont extend, let’s just get this hell over please! He clearly doesn’t care about his staff and how extending is going to effect them!
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Having spoken to fellow fee earners all day about this persons comment… I can confirm we very much disagree wry strongly with his comment. But none are surprised given the firm he works for.
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