Summer Budget 2015 – Landlords Reactions

Reply to the comment left by “Manchester Landlord” at “21/09/2015 – 10:12“:

Also noted a rather obvious HPC submission!

Reply to the comment left by “Manchester Landlord” at “21/09/2015 – 10:13“:

Hi Manchester Landlord.
Which one are you referring to?

Reply to the comment left by “Ros .” at “21/09/2015 – 13:11“:

Hi Ros

See the full list of submissions here:

http://services.parliament.uk/bills/2015-16/finance/documents.html

Mark Anderson and Simon Sheppard have submitted the exact same wording to support clause 24.

Having skim read most of the submissions which are excellent by the way, I am now mildly optimistic that the committee will see sense and amend the clause.

I have read the written submissions too. There are some well reasoned ones in there and others that are a bit ‘ranty’

On balance, I think the counter case has been put well if the committee takes the time to properly consider the submissions.

I am not sure the government is minded to consider the counter case.

Even if it is so minded, it may pull out its ‘not many people are affected line’ and carry on anyway.

We will see.

Reply to the comment left by “Manchester Landlord” at “21/09/2015 – 13:24“:

Thanks for the link Manchester Landlord.
I agree that the submissions are excellent – at least a quarter of them came from Property118. So we are not taking this lying down.

We are now also interested in tabling an amendment. We have a couple of Conservative MPs who may be willing, but does anyone else here have an MP they think might be willing and able to table it if necessary? It could come from any party – we’re favouring Conservatives, but if necessary it could be an MP from another party. Please let me know asap.

Reply to the comment left by “Jon Pipllman” at “21/09/2015 – 14:05“:

I share your concerns Jon, they will not want to look like they have egg on their face.

http://www.property-matters-law.co.uk/investment/

Private Residential Sector – is PRS a solution to the housing shortage? The panel concluded that the success of PRS relies on the Government to institutionalise it and developers to provide the right sort of stock. Together, can they convince a nation of aspiring homeowners to change their attitude to renting?

Homelet Insurance have sent an email today entitled Landlord Lowdown, with a link to a blog about the proposed change:

http://homelet.co.uk/landlord/landlord-lowdown-blog/article/could-landlords-raise-rents-post-budget?utm_source=E%20News&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=Landlord%20Lowdown&dm_i=2LB6,F02D,38XQMR,YSSS,1

It is the worst one yet.

It seems to be aimed at reassuring tenants that rents will not rise because of the change. It even states: “One positive of the proposed new rules for both existing landlords and tenants is the increased professionalism they will encourage. By having to think even more carefully about investments and really treating letting property as a business, rogue operators could be further discouraged from entering the industry”.

I posted the following as the only comment so far, and replied to their email with a similar message:

“This blog about the proposed tax change seems to be aimed at tenants. It shows that you either do not understand how the tax change will work, or you do not care.

In 2020, when landlords’ finance costs are disallowed, their deemed rental profit will be the real profit plus the finance costs. They will be taxed on this deemed profit, which may push them from the basic rate band into the higher rate band. Some will end up paying more in tax than their real profit and some of them will be made bankrupt because of it. Others will pay tax when there is a real loss.

A spreadsheet that will work out an individual’s tax with both today’s rules and with the new rules, so that people can see exactly what the proposed change in taxation means for them can be downloaded from https://www.property118.com/budget-2015-landlords-reactions/76164/comment-page-436/#comments

Property118 is campaigning to fight the introduction of the proposed change, in tandem with other landlords who have set up a website looking at the proposal from the point of view of everybody concerned: http://saynotogeorge.co.uk

Another landlord has set up a petition which over 29,000 have signed: https://petition.parliament.uk…

If you are going to draw the attention of your landlord customers to the proposed tax change, you should at least show the effect it will have. It would be better if you could give them the chance to join the fight against this iniquitous levy.

Reply to the comment left by “Appalled Landlord” at “21/09/2015 – 17:48“:

This is what I have posted, it is awaiting moderation ….

Some landlords will not raise rent, instead they will sell. In fact, as much as half of the available rental property today is likely to have been sold to owner occupiers or repossessed by the year 2020 by my calculations based on this ludicrous tax change. Of course this is what the government wants. It doesn’t really care too much about people who are unable to be homeowners does it?

Ask yourself this question; if the government gets its way and the UK becomes a nation of homeowners again, where will those who cannot afford to buy all live if the rental stock has halved.

Will they all share?

Of course not, landlords will not allow that!

What is more likely is that the landlords who don’t sell will have their pick of tenants and be able to charge whatever the best tenants can afford to pay.

Time to start investing into cardboard box manufacturers perhaps? After all, that’s going to be the only accommodation available if half of the private rented stock gets sold to owner occupiers.

By the way, private landlords are responsible for around 80%+ of all new housing developments in the UK over the last two decades. Without an incentive for them to invest it is possible that new development will contract too. Does the Government not realise the problem is lack of housing and to discourage investment into providing more is sheer madness?

I particularly liked following submissions:

Kathy Miller & Tenants, Mark Brown and Neil Patterson’s. I have not read all of them but aforementioned were well structured with excellent salient points.