LBTT in Scotland

83dons2

I think from the announcement yesterday it is only stamp duty in England and Wales that is being suspended? Do you think the Scottish government is likely to follow suit soon and suspend LBTT tax in Scotland? Might be worth me holding off buying to see as I could save a fair bit of money. It would seem odd that there be such a discrepancy within the UK for the property market and Scotland seem to be following England with most things a few weeks later during the time.

grumiofoundation

Don’t know about Scotland but in similar situation in Wales. There were discrepancies with England prior to this announcement anyway so don’t know if it will make much difference? 

Edit - as posted below new measures don’t apply to Wales!  

davidmcn

83dons2 said:

I think from the announcement yesterday it is only stamp duty in England and Wales that is being suspended? 

England and Northern Ireland. I suspect Scotland and Wales may well follow suit as they have generally with most principles in LBTT and LTT, but there are existing differences in rates/bands etc and I haven't heard anybody being at all certain about it.

Wkmg

I doubt the SNP will offer as generous a reduction. They aren’t big fans of land owners. 

Wkmg

Was just looking at their tax. It's already huge compared to England (at my end of the market anyway. Even without the English tax cut I'd be paying about twice as much in Scotland.

Wkmg

https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/18567246.disappointment-scottish-government-confirms-no-cut-property-transaction-tax/

davidmcn

Wkmg said:

Was just looking at their tax. It's already huge compared to England (at my end of the market anyway. Even without the English tax cut I'd be paying about twice as much in Scotland.

Bear in mind the difference in average property prices though between Scotland and SE England at least - if you're spending say £500k in Scotland you're beyond "normal" territory and into "member of the 1%".

Wkmg

davidmcn said:

Wkmg said:

Was just looking at their tax. It's already huge compared to England (at my end of the market anyway. Even without the English tax cut I'd be paying about twice as much in Scotland.

Bear in mind the difference in average property prices though between Scotland and SE England at least - if you're spending say £500k in Scotland you're beyond "normal" territory and into "member of the 1%".

You say that but I used to live in Edinburgh (18 months ago)  and it's quite easy to spend £1,000,000 there if you want to live in a popular part of town like Stockbridge. I know it's not London prices but it is comparable to some Southern English cities. I also used to live in Aberdeen during oil (about 6 years ago) and prices then were insanely high. I was renting at the time and moved from Brighton to Aberdeen. Flats were similar prices. Not sure about now.

83dons2

Wkmg said:

https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/18567246.disappointment-scottish-government-confirms-no-cut-property-transaction-tax/

Damn. Might have to revise my vote for them at the next election!

davidmcn

Wkmg said:

davidmcn said:

Wkmg said:

Was just looking at their tax. It's already huge compared to England (at my end of the market anyway. Even without the English tax cut I'd be paying about twice as much in Scotland.

Bear in mind the difference in average property prices though between Scotland and SE England at least - if you're spending say £500k in Scotland you're beyond "normal" territory and into "member of the 1%".

You say that but I used to live in Edinburgh (18 months ago)  and it's quite easy to spend £1,000,000 there if you want to live in a popular part of town like Stockbridge.

Even there it's much easier to spend less though! ESPC currently has 969 properties listed in Edinburgh. If we're generous enough to assume that the ones listed at £950k+ will go for over £1m, that's only 8 of them.

Wkmg

A property listed for 950,000 plus will go for a lot more than 1,000,000 in a popular part of town like Stockbridge or Morningside. It really will. It's actually very frustrating because mortgage lenders will only lend based on the HR value therefore you need a huge deposit to get somewhere in a desirable place. That plus the huge land tax makes buying very stressful North of the border.