Revaluation of Council Tax bands that reflect today's values.

jan31

Hard to believe that my council tax bill is still based on how much my property was worth in 1991. Given that council tax is now such a lot of money should it not at least be based on current values? A lot has changed in 33 years so it's difficult to see how such an out of date tax base has any credibility. Is the Valuation Office Agency pushing at all for an up to date valuation list? Is anyone? 

TadleyBaggie

So they revalue the bands, revalue the property value and the nett result is you would probably be in the same band as before. Lot of work for little or no gain.

Peter999_2

Don't forget the government we have.    It would cost an absolute fortunate to revalue all the properties and guess who'd end up paying for that.

I don't see a problem with it myself, don't forget properties do tend to get re-valued when they are sold.

elsien

Peter999_2 said:

Don't forget the government we have.    It would cost an absolute fortunate to revalue all the properties and guess who'd end up paying for that.

I don't see a problem with it myself, don't forget properties do tend to get re-valued when they are sold.

Surely the cost of revaluing would be the same regardless of which flavour was in charge at the time?

p00hsticks

jan31 said:

Hard to believe that my council tax bill is still based on how much my property was worth in 1991. Given that council tax is now such a lot of money should it not at least be based on current values? A lot has changed in 33 years so it's difficult to see how such an out of date tax base has any credibility. Is the Valuation Office Agency pushing at all for an up to date valuation list? Is anyone? 

What would be the point ? The most expensive houses will still be in the highest band, the least expensive in the lowest.

There might be a few outliers where particular properties have either gained or lost incredibly in value when compared wit the general market around them  (for example ones with cladding issues) bot overall you'd just be raising all the band values by a certain percentage in line with the increase in house prices since 1991 and the vast majority of properties would end up in the same band as they started in.

As others above have said, great effort and expense resulting in very little change.  

Peter999_2

elsien said:

Peter999_2 said:

Don't forget the government we have.    It would cost an absolute fortunate to revalue all the properties and guess who'd end up paying for that.

I don't see a problem with it myself, don't forget properties do tend to get re-valued when they are sold.

Surely the cost of revaluing would be the same regardless of which flavour was in charge at the time?

It does certainly make a difference who was in power.   If it was somebody competent it would be a lot cheaper.  However, this government and the previous governement would start with good ideas then they would be watered down to get the approval through the commons/HOL until it would end up costing a fortune and acheive nothing that it set out to.  Smart meters are a great example of this, it could have been done so well and cheaply (and completed by 2020) but no chance with the incompetentcy involved.

born_again

jan31 said:

Hard to believe that my council tax bill is still based on how much my property was worth in 1991. Given that council tax is now such a lot of money should it not at least be based on current values? A lot has changed in 33 years so it's difficult to see how such an out of date tax base has any credibility. Is the Valuation Office Agency pushing at all for an up to date valuation list? Is anyone? 

Please do not give politicians any more idea's to fleece the public.

Lets see, hard up local councils. What could go wrong 🤦‍♀️
Well they now need a higher band or 2 for the higher priced houses, to make it fairer to all. We will keep the increase of banding limits below inflation, but increase your house value by inflation. Thus everyone goes up a band....

Reminds me of a quote heard today on the 50% increase of bus fares in the budget. We did that so bus companies only increase prices by inflation 😶‍🌫️🤦‍♀️🤣

ChadValley

There are 8 council bands, moving homes into the band above their current one would hurt the poorest people in society, if your not going to move homes up a band, there is no gain for the treasury, what's needed in extra bands at the top of the ladder.  

pbez64

There was a reval done in 1990S in Wales but the then govt realised that it would hit the people in the middle bands the most- the ones that tend to decide the results of an election. So they shelved the plans for a full reval. 

Also the reval would have been revenue neutral. Ie raise the same amount of money but the amounts raised between bands would change

There was an anecdotal story at the time amongst local government revenues officer that the then minister in charge did not/could not understand what revenue neutral meant but simply thought everyone would pay more!!!

So by increasing the number of properties in higher bands it meant people in lower bands paid less due to way c tax is calculated- a band A is 2/3 of a D and a H is 2xD. 

That's why it's regressive
 
A person in band H can only ever pay 3x what a person in band A pays irrespective of how much his house is worth over 320,000 (based on 1991 figures)

When a Council needs to work out how much money it needs to raise it does it by converting all the bands to Band D and then simply divides what it needs to raise by the number of band D's in its area.