Chip

As Leslie said things are not getting better,they're getting worse. Thats why I begrudge paying it.

If someone buys a house for 249000 they pay £2490 stamp duty.
If they pay £251000 thats just £2000 more they pay £7530.
Surely not right is it.

As for saying that if I can afford a houe of that price then I should pay the tax thats bollox. I worked bloody hard for what Ive got whilst others who **** all their money up against the wall, asylum seekers etc expect honest tax payers like me to keep them.

Chip

Edited to sat that the price of houses has rocketed during the last few years and stamp duty, inheritance tax etc should keep pace with this.

[Edited by Chip - 9/7/2003 11:20:37 AM]

ProperCharlie

I don't usually complain about tax but I think that stamp duty has become unjustifiable. The rates have not been adjusted to take into account the massive rise in house prices. Also, it makes no sense that the rates are fixed - it should be that you only pay the higher level of tax on the amount that you are over the threshold, in the same way as income tax. So if you buy a house for 300k, you pay 1% on 250k and 3% on 50K. that would have saved me quite a few grand, and would take away the incentive to do the "fixtures and fittings" scam.

[Edited by ProperCharlie - 9/7/2003 12:29:50 PM]

Scooby96

Do what a few ministers have done and agree a lower purchase price but pay the difference in cash.

Buy the house for £249,999 and pay the remaining £25-50k another way!!

[Edited by Scooby96 - 9/8/2003 10:07:07 AM]

ChrisB

Which bit Scoob96?

I hadn't noticed that Iain

Oh,

[Edited by ChrisB - 9/8/2003 3:30:57 PM]

Chip

Been recently looking at moving house.Havent paid much attention to housing market til now and didnt realise how much has to be paid in stamp duty.

As were looking at buying a house for 275-300 thats means Ill have to pay between £8250 and £9000 whereas whoever buys my house for around £200000 wil pay only £2000.

Thing is now as we dont really have to move for any reason I really cannot justify to myself writing a cheque to Gordon Brown for £9000. Another case of this government ripping us of with taxes after all Tony said about not raising them.

Chip.

boxst

Hello

If you can afford a house that is so expensive, then you can afford to pay it.

That's the government line, personally I almost choked when I saw the stamp duty bill on the house I bought a few months ago.

Steve.

paulr

TBH i have to agree with Boxst,if you can afford a house that price when you dont even have to move then you cant really complain.
Labour promised better health service,education and help for the lower paid,....the money has to come from somewhere.

Leslie

After 6 years there is no sign of any of those three things yet! regularly getting worse in fact

paulr

Are you stalking me!!!!!!!!!!.......

carl

The only thing you can do is arrange a purchase price of £249,995 and the rest for 'fixtures and fittings'. You can probably manage £10k-£20k for these (carpets, wallcoverings, central heating -- that counts, you know, kitchen fittings), but you'd be hard pressed to manage £30k-£50k. I believe that the IR pay a lot of attention to house sales around the £250k mark to make sure this sort of thing's not happening.

paulr

They do indeed.

MARK MORRIS

i was lucky, when i moved 2 months ago the area ive gone too is exempt from stamp duty, saved 1k, obviously i couldnt afford a 300k house
mark

Gordo

and they wonder why there aren't enough houses on the market!

I cannot believe the Labour government has been allowed to get away with this one.

And for all those who spout the socialist redistribution of wealth ****e, let's look at the facts:

- You are buying your house with a combination of capital and debt
- Let's say this is split 10:90% (i.e. 90% mortgage)
- BUT, you get taxed on the whole amount. This means you pay tax on not only the money you have already been taxed on, but also the debt you are about to take on - effectively a tax TEN TIMES higher than you think it is, on your capital.
- It does not take a mathematical genius to realise that, should you move several times, your capital which you have worked years to build up is rapidly eroded
- and why shouldn't you move, it's a free country and an apparently free market, right? haha, course it's not whilst this tax is in place

Now the Labour justification for this rediculous tax, is that it's fair as if you've got more, you can afford to pay more, right? great - but this unjust tax restricts the property market at all levels (you need properties at the upper end of the market to be for sale to encourage to trade up to move properties at the lower levels)

But, people are deciding to hang on to their house and put on another w4nky conservatory on their little shoebox house instead of moving up the ladder, as they cannot afford this tax.

And it's also worth noting that the people who support this tax have either not moved recently, and therefore do not understand it, or have no intention of ever moving again and so it will never affect them.

Oh, for an honest government and a voting public smart enough to actually make a difference in our apparent 'democracy'

Gordo

scoob_babe

Chip - you're right, when the stamp duty bands of £60k and £250k were introduced, I believe it was because the vast majority of house were well under £60k all over the country. Now £250k is becoming more and more attainable due to the rocketing of the market. Why aren't the bands moved upwards? Because instead of getting a few thousand pounds off the super-rich in the £250k band, they can get it from practically everybody without lifting a finger.
I can't see why they can't stagger the tax, if they HAVE to keep it at these levels over the bands e.g. price of house is £255k, you pay 1% of the value upto the limit and then 3% on over and above the limit. I guess it would be too much paperwork!

workshy_fopp

It used to be 1% on the £250k then 3% on the rest.
Gordon Brown changed that one pretty quickly after Labour got in.
It's 4% of the whole over £500K a mere £25,000.

Brendan Hughes

You bunch of whiners.

In Portugal, up until recently, stamp duty was TEN PER CENT of the purchase price. Most people fiddled the system and paid half, if not less. It was so ingrained that I went into banks to ask for a loan, and when mentioning stamp duty they would wink and say "of course, you don't have to pay that." and produce a computer printout of the breakdown of an official mortgage and parallel personal loan. Even their computer systems were set up for what was effectively tax fraud!

As of July the system has been reworked and the maximum for a purchase of about 300k pounds is six per cent. I'm buying a house for a bit less than that and will be writing a cheque for 22 000 euros - wassat, 14-15k pounds?

Stop whining - you've never had it so good!

J4CKO

iTrader: (1)

Why do people get so jealous when somebody mentions that they are buying a high value property, I think there are a lot of Scoob owners that lavish 20 grand onto their cars (usually on a collection of credit cards) and live with mum or in a starter home because they have spent so much on cars !

I wont mention how much mine is worth or the fact its payed off.

boxst

Hello

Remember that one of the next labour initiatives is to tax you when you sell your house as well. The longer you stay in your house, then they higher the tax apparently.

I don't know if they one will actually get through, but they were the plans...

Steve.

Chip

Brendan
How much does the average house in Potugal cost compared to aevrage earnings there.

Chip.

Diesel

This THE reason to vote anything but Labour in the next general election. It is a preposterously unjust and unfair tax, and gets proportionally MORE unfair and more unjust as prices and inflation take their effect.

I bought a 3 bed semi - absolutely nothing posh at all - and I had to put £11k on my mortgage to give the gvt its pound of flesh. I have to go into debt over 25 years to pay back a TAX from my already taxed salary - monstrously unfair. I'm still LIVID about it.

workshy_fopp

Diesel - trouble is taxes never get repealed by the suceeding government. Too much of an earner for them. Once it's on the books we're stuck with it.

Chip

Didnt taxes actually go down under the Tories.

Chip.

midget1500

camk

Direct taxation went down under the Tories(income tax), indirect taxation went up e.g VAT

Chip

So what was the overall level of taxation. Less than it is now? I think so.

Chip.

zoog

I'm moving next Friday - and Gordon Brown's coffers are £21,200 fuller thanks to my cheque to him for the 4% Stamp duty.

I hope he spends it wisely.....some hope.

Chip

Wow thats a £530000 house.Thnig is if you bung that £21200 on your mortgage it prob works out at about £50000 over 25 years. Thats terrible.

Chip.

Luke

Old maggie thatcher got away with it.....She saved paying 100 of thousands.

Scot123

They do if you riot hard enough.

Poll tax anybody?

paulr

So what was the overall level of taxation. Less than it is now? I think so

Its amazing how hard it is to actually find that out.If i recall the tax burden under the Tories was around 36%,under Labour its now around 38%.