Taxman to target BTL landlords

Graham_Devon

But they will tell you where you are OK to continue avoiding paying your taxes

The taxman is creating three new 'taskforces' to uncover tax evasion among taxi drivers, street market traders and buy-to-let landlords.

It is part of a recent crackdown on 'hotspots' identified across Britain by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) - a result of the Government’s £917million spending review.
The aim is raise an additional £7billion each year by 2014/15. It has so far recovered £50m in 2012.

A taskforce to tackle tax evasion among buy-to-let landlords will focus on East Anglia, London, Leeds, York, Leicester, Nottingham, Lincoln, Durham and Sunderland and is expected to recover £17million

So you'll be ok anywhere else....love how they tell you where they will be inspecting! Why not just keep quiet....bound to get more doing it right that way!

If they knock on your door, might be worth saying you are a vodafone customer... They may just leave you be


http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/news/article-2152701/Taxman-target-buy-let-landlords-taxi-firms-Del-Boy-London-market-traders.html

chucknorris

This is good news for (honest) landlords (not bad) because I for one do not want my competition to have an unfair advantage.

Wookster

About time too

kabayiri

£17 million you say? Pah.

Dave 'take me to lunch' Hartnett can let a large company off 10 times this figure when invited to dine in style to discuss taxation arrangements.

MacMickster

Graham_Devon wrote: »

So you'll be ok anywhere else....love how they tell you where they will be inspecting! Why not just keep quiet....bound to get more doing it right that way!

I'd guess that the idea is similar to the old TV detector vans. Advertise in the local press that detector vans would be touring the area next week, and all of a sudden there were queues out of the door at post offices of people wanting to buy a TV licence.

Given the reports of the number of "voluntary disclosures" made by people with offshore accounts when they obtained detailsfrom Switzerland and Lichtenstein, I'd imagine that HMRC are trying to set up specialist teams to go into areas to see if the publicity brings similar results.

No doubt, if it goes to plan, they will announce more towns and cities that they will look at in 6 months time.

ILW

Simple first step would be to make it a legal requirement for a letting agent to inform HMRC of any tenancies.

MacMickster

ILW wrote: »

Simple first step would be to make it a legal requirement for a letting agent to inform HMRC of any tenancies.

Add to this, local councils required to advise them of the addresses of claimants of housing benefit and the Land Registry to notify ownership of multiple properties.

Edit: I've just remembered from when I used to let out a property quite a few years ago, my solicitor advising me that for any tenancy agreement to stand up in court, it had to have stamp duty paid on it and be presented to the stamp office (now part of HMRC). I'm not sure if this is still the case, but if so then it should give HMRC all of the information that they require.

Yorkie1

No SDLT on leases below a certain length these days - so most residential tenancies wouldn't be caught any longer.

Thrugelmir

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Why not just keep quiet....bound to get more doing it right that way!

Maybe because it's not very easy to hide a house GD.

Purchase and sale records remain on file. So not if you escape the taxman's clutches.