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MSE News: Call to up tax-free lodger allowance

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Comments

  • puddings_2
    puddings_2 Posts: 1,889 Forumite
    edgex wrote: »
    which would be better:
    an elderly woman in a 3/4 bed house with a lodger, whilst a family with 2 kids are cramped into a 2bed house
    or
    that woman moving into the 2bed house, & the family occupying the 3/4bed house

    The elderly woman is unlikely to want to move house whatever happens. So this way she could stay in her house and get two or three lodgers.
    Believe me, there is absolutely no shortage of people wanting to lodge. When I get a vacancy and put an advert in our local paper, I could fill that room twenty times over with the response that it generates.
  • If upping the allowance is intended to prevent repossessions, then the expenditure should be targeted at those who need help to prevent repossession. Otherwise, it's the "Maggie Thatcher" argument i.e. those that don't need the allowance get it anyway and those that can will abuse the system to get an allowance they don't need!

    I am reminded of this .... "The only thing we learn from history is that we don't learn"! :mad:
    Warning ..... I'm a peri-menopausal axe-wielding maniac ;)
  • puddings wrote: »
    The elderly woman is unlikely to want to move house whatever happens. So this way she could stay in her house and get two or three lodgers.

    Yup - and Maggie Thatcher (and others) could live in a twenty bedroomed house and let out one or two just to get the allowance. But is MT in danger of being evicted or repossessed? :confused:
    Warning ..... I'm a peri-menopausal axe-wielding maniac ;)
  • tbs624
    tbs624 Posts: 10,816 Forumite
    edited 12 November 2009 at 8:55AM
    puddings wrote: »
    Im glad MSE are supporting this campaign.
    MSE is reporting the campaign as a news item and a topic for discussion rather than specifically supporting it AFIAA
    puddings wrote: »
    People that have plenty of money probably wouldn't choose to share their home even if they did have the room. It's people that are skint, like me that do it.

    Without my lodgers I would have been reposessed by now. The scheme for tax free income should continue to be encouraged, household bills have shot up loads in the last 12 years, surely its time that the Inland Revenue adjusted the threshold to put the scheme back into the same perspective that it was when first set up.
    When you take on lodgers you have the option of whether or not you use the RaR scheme. If your bills are particularly high you may be better accounting for room rental income on your tax return in the standard way
    puddings wrote: »
    Write to your MP!
    Also write if you don't agree with the allowance being hiked to 9 grand
  • I let a 4-bedroom property for £5,400 per year and have to pay tax on income. If I moved in ;) and let all the rooms to a lodger, I'd pay no tax.

    I'd scrap the allowance or let (single property) BTL LLs to opt out of paying tax too.

    GG
    There are 10 types of people in this world. Those who understand binary and those that don't.
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