Stamp Duty Holiday - Back Dated?

ftb8482

Any idea about those currently between exchange and completion? I take it no holiday post exchange?

SuperHan

Jessieh said:

jon81uk said:

If the tax rate had gone up, would you be calling HMRC offering to pay them extra? Then unfortunately it applies the other way round too.

They would have announced the tax rate increase much in advance so people had time to plan in advance and decide what they wanted to do.

Would they? There isn't much of a precedent for this. In fact, an increase in tax was announced at the last budget after it was leaked to the press. They went through great pains to introduce anti-forestalling legislation which meant that anyone who tried to get their affairs in order ahead of the change were potentially caught by rules increasing their tax bill that they didn't even know existed. 
If they had given too much lead time on the stamp duty holiday they would have stalled the market even more (which is why it was introduced overnight, and not in Autumn like had been mooted in the past few days). 
It is just unlucky. And I say that as someone who has suffered the 3% SDLT surcharge because I have a flat affected by the cladding scandal which has become valueless and unsaleable. It's an expensive misfortune. 

davidmcn

Jessieh said:

shinryu744 said:

moneysavinghero said:

Stamp duty changes are designed to encourage people to buy. You did not need any encouragement, so why would they want to backdate it for you? I bought my last house 10 years ago, can it be backdated to then too?

I recently completed, exchanged contracts and even had to change the mortgage to just myself because the other person was furloughed. I had to pay out 9500 that I can really use right now. And you can lose your whole deposit and worst if you pull out of a property after exchanging contracts. It should be back dated to a couple months. But I agree with you, they won't. 

I also completed two weeks ago and am quite annoyed by how the government did this. There was barely any news about this from a reliable source few weeks back, otherwise I would have held on the transaction. It just doesn't seem fair to people who were already helping the economy to go as usual, not to mention the £10K stamp duty tax I paid was already post income tax.

It's utterly standard that you don't get stuff like this announced in advance, and there are good reasons not to as others have pointed out. They have to draw the line somewhere, and it's bad luck if you're on the wrong side of it.

nicolebarton

I agree, the reason I am so upset is I am 8 months pregnant and we HAD to move as they locked down just as we had given up our accommodation and had to live in temporary accommodation during lockdown with family, which was so stressful.  To now have committed to a house purchase and lost £5k because he won't backdate it when we were in catch 22 situation as had nowhere to live and a baby on the way is really unfair as Coronavirus has impacted us heavily.  He should really be backdating it for those impacted!  We only completed a few weeks ago and that was because we had to push it through to get somewhere to live in time to give birth.

moneysavinghero

nicolebarton said:

I agree, the reason I am so upset is I am 8 months pregnant and we HAD to move as they locked down just as we had given up our accommodation and had to live in temporary accommodation during lockdown with family, which was so stressful.  To now have committed to a house purchase and lost £5k because he won't backdate it when we were in catch 22 situation as had nowhere to live and a baby on the way is really unfair as Coronavirus has impacted us heavily.  He should really be backdating it for those impacted!  We only completed a few weeks ago and that was because we had to push it through to get somewhere to live in time to give birth.

You have not lost anything. Your house has still cost you the same amount that previously agreed you were happy to pay. If anything, you have gained because the value of your new house may now fall slightly less that it would have done if this has not been announced.

kitty__2

ftb8482 said:

Any idea about those currently between exchange and completion? I take it no holiday post exchange?

Pretty sure it's based on the completion date so you should be fine. Well the BBC seem to think so anyway:

"The holiday applies from 8 July, which means anyone completing a property purchase before that date will have to pay the full normal stamp duty."

"That means any property purchases below the new level will not need to pay stamp duty as long as the deal is completed before 31 March 2021."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-53319433

Bonniepurple

Could we get this backdated from 16/12/16? What do you mean, no?!  Anyway, for all those complaining, just remember that governments of whichever colour tend to give with one hand and take away somewhere along the line with the other.  Where is the money going to be a made up from?  The obvious areas are transport (fuel, VED), VAT (Which will affect everyone, not just those buying houses in the next few months) - or indeed Stamp Duty which will impact those of us who are preparing to sell/buy in the next 12 months but not the next 8 months.

MobileSaver

ftb8482 said:

Any idea about those currently between exchange and completion? I take it no holiday post exchange?

I think it's your lucky day; the gov.uk site says the SDLT rate is based on when you purchase (i.e. Complete) the property and so when you Exchanged makes no difference at all. (The only catch is if the gov.uk is incorrect but we won't know until the actual legislation is available to be checked - does anyone have any ideas when/how the legislation will be made available?)

dbailey10

I sympathise with those who have recently completed and would have benefited from this but lots here seem to be missing the point when asking for a backdate. The reason the government have introduced this is to encourage people who may have held off selling/buying because they are concerned about falling prices or job security etc to proceed. Yes, some lucky folks who have already agreed and could have afforded to pay the standard stamp duty have caught a lucky and profitable break but there's absolutely zero chance of any backdating as it's simply not what this tax holiday is designed for. It's not to put money back in peoples pockets who went through with purchases at full stamp duty rates, it's to encourage more purchases over the 'danger period' of the next 9 months which then drives the local economy as people renovate etc.

Luckystarr_2

We completed this morning but our solicitor paid the stamp duty a few days ago so no idea if we can claim it back. If not it’s not the end of the world, we expected to pay it but with a lot of work to do on the house it would be very welcome.