Am looking at a farm property that happens to have 2 houses on it, being sold as one lot.

Obviously I can only live in one and in that case, I can only have a residential mortgage on one house. The other would have to be treated as a second home. It would seem that I would (after April 2016) have to pay the "2nd home rate" for Stamp Duty. Its not a BTL though I'm intending to renovate it for self-catering purposes.

I could pay cash for one house and mortgage on the other, though the mortgage of the other would have to stand up on its own. The other downside to this is that if I paid cash for one, depending how much, then it will reduce the amount of spare £ I have for doing both houses up.

Each property is subject to council tax. Due to location etc, its not suitable for renting out long-term.

Anyone got any sensible ideas of how I should approach this? I run a small Ltd for my work, so I have the option of using that in some way. Farm would be produce some income in other ways.

 

Can you not buy the farm as a package, with the farm and the main house being the mortgaged property and the other classed as a barn or ruin? therefore not habitable and not then classed as a house?

 

How can you do this if it's being sold as 1 lot?

You could buy it personally using a mortgage then split it up so it's 2 lots and sell 1 lot to your company, or vice versa, depends where the money is really

 

It used to be quite common round here to remove the roof from properties that were no longer in use. This meant it no longer was liable to rates and taxes etc.

Not sure if the loop hole still exists and obviously it depends on how unfit for habitation the property already is.

 

Does not removing something like the kitchen serve the same problem? I am guessing that there would be certain things required to make it habitable.