No stamp duty payable in a shared ownership staircasing with a Market Value Election clause?!

DearJane

Hello! Sorry if this may sound like a stupid question, but would really appreciate someone to provide an opinion.

I recently completed staircasing (to 100%) for a property I purchased via a shared-ownership scheme. Before staircasing, I owned less than 80% of the property and have never paid any stamp duty before.

While I had expected to pay for stamp duty, my solicitor told me there’s no stamp duty payable in completion, because there’s a ‘Market Value Election’ clause registered in the lease, as such, stamp duty was paid at the outset on the full market value of the property as opposed to paying in stages. I was also told as staircasing occurred by memorandum, hence no return is due with HMRC.

I’ve never paid any stamp duty for the property, is it possible that I don’t have to pay because there’s such a clause in the lease? I’ve contacted HMRC but they weren’t able to provide advice and simply referred me to their site, which didn’t provide an answer either.

Any comments / experience anyone could share would be much appreciated! Many thanks!

boo_star

If you haven't ever paid it then your solicitor is confused?

Why not raise it with them? It's what you're paying them for after all.

AdrianC

If 0% was due on the full value of the property at the time of original purchase, then it'd have been daft not to take that...

When did you buy, and how much did you pay?

Sandyra

Yeah I would go back to your solicitor and challenge. I chose to pay my stamp duty in stages and opted not to do the market value election. I paid something like £192 at the beginning. So therefore I paid nothing when I staircased to 75% then paid stamp duty when I staircased to 100%. I’m sure SDLT geek can provide advice.

00ec25

boo_star wrote: »

If you haven't ever paid it then your solicitor is confused?

Why not raise it with them? It's what you're paying them for after all.

with respect I doubt you know what you are talking about

it is perfectly possible, indeed an encouraged valid tax planning step, to make a market value election if the full value at that point of purchase is below the threshold . No SDLT paid then, and none payable ever again, despite rising values. That is the whole point of the exercise, save tax.

Crucially, having made such an election it does indeed carry over to subsequent purchasers.

this really is explained on the Govt website.
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/sdlt-shared-ownership-property

If OP cannot understand that then by all means contact his solicitor, but the answer will be yes, perfectly correct if that was what happened originally, and as the solicitor is the one with the paperwork, they know it's true or would not have said so