Spring Budget 2024 – Chancellor attacks holiday rentals and Multiple Dwellings Relief

Spring Budget 2024 – Chancellor attacks holiday rentals and Multiple Dwellings Relief

13:47 PM, 6th March 2024, About 2 months ago 45

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The Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has announced the end of a tax scheme that offered tax incentives for landlords with holiday lets in favour of long-term renters.

He said the Furnished Holiday Lettings regime was causing a ‘distortion’ in the housing market and depriving local people of affordable homes.

Mr Hunt said: “I am concerned this tax regime is creating a distortion meaning there are not enough properties available for long term rental by local people.

“So, to make the tax system work better for local communities I am going to abolish the Furnished Holiday Lettings regime.”

Allowed holiday let landlords to claim tax relief

The scheme allowed holiday let landlords to claim tax relief on their properties if they let them out to holidaymakers for at least 105 days a year.

Mr Hunt said he had also examined the Multiple Dwellings Relief, which gave stamp duty discounts to buyers of multiple properties in one transaction.

He said this relief was meant to encourage investment in the private rented sector, but an analysis found it had failed to do so and was ‘being regularly abused’.

The FHL proposal was flagged up by the Sunday Times with a potential of ending tax breaks worth £300 million and will see the regime being abolished from April 2025.

Landlords received some good news from the Chancellor

However, landlords received some good news from the Chancellor, who said he was lowering the higher rate of property capital gains tax from 28% to 24%.

He said this move was based on the advice of the Office for Budget Responsibility and the Treasury, who had found that it would boost revenues by stimulating more transactions.

Mr Hunt added that the cut in property capital gains tax was ‘for you, Angela’, referring to the Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner over her recent issues when selling a council house.

Other notable announcements in the Chancellor’s Budget include:

  • VAT registration threshold for businesses to rise from £85,000 to £90,000 from April.
  • The government will continue to provide the same amount of money for the Household Support Fund (HSF) for another six months. The HSF is a programme that started in 2021 to help families cope with the increasing expenses of living. The fund is distributed to local councils to aid families with low incomes in their regions. The money enables local councils to offer families assistance through food banks, warm spaces and food vouchers.

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Comments

GlanACC

12:39 PM, 7th March 2024, About 2 months ago

Reply to the comment left by Dylan Morris at 07/03/2024 - 09:17
S24 is not implementd for LTD companies, so yes

Rod

18:31 PM, 7th March 2024, About 2 months ago

Not clear whether FHL income will still qualify for pension contributions tax relief.

GlanACC

19:34 PM, 7th March 2024, About 2 months ago

Reply to the comment left by Rod at 07/03/2024 - 18:31
I suspect it will, especially as it is possible the lettings charges could be eligible for VAT which long term lets are not

Beaver

17:21 PM, 8th March 2024, About 2 months ago

Reply to the comment left by Rod at 06/03/2024 - 14:55
Presumably if you have a portfolio of FHL properties and you are spending a significant amount of time on that you could still incorporate that business and apply for roll-over relief? Is that correct?

And if that is correct then I'm guessing that this change only affects the small porfolio FHL owner with maybe one property rented out on Airbnb? Again, have I understood?

I suspect that the rich people with second homes in desirable holiday locations will just hang onto them anyway and just not bother renting them out because it won't be worth the hassle.

GlanACC

18:00 PM, 8th March 2024, About 2 months ago

Reply to the comment left by Beaver at 08/03/2024 - 17:21
As I have previously said incorporation for only a couple of properties is not economicaly a good idea (I have 2 PRS properties and lookd at it bust cost too much). I don't know what the cut off size of the portfolio would be , I am guessing around 4 to make it economically viable (it will also depend on the equity in the properties)

Beaver

8:58 AM, 9th March 2024, About 2 months ago

Reply to the comment left by GlanACC at 08/03/2024 - 18:00
But if you have a large portfolio of FHL properties you can still incorporate it, roll over the relief and deduct your expenses?

GlanACC

9:02 AM, 9th March 2024, About 2 months ago

Reply to the comment left by Beaver at 09/03/2024 - 08:58
You need to have a chat with your accountant, I use a large national chain of accountants and they have specialists in various areas. Each property portfolio is different so I don't think there is a general 'one fits all' answer to your question. It also depends on what you want to do with the properties, pass them on, use them as a pension etc.

PAUL BARTLETT

10:23 AM, 13th March 2024, About 2 months ago

Reply to the comment left by GlanACC at 08/03/2024 - 18:00
"As I have previously said incorporation for only a couple of properties is not economicaly a good idea"

Interesting comment. Are you suggesting that the savings, motivated by avoiding unfair tax (Section 24), are less than the costs of incorporation and running the business to a corporate standard?

Why would those costs not scale up with the number of properties so that there is a break-even point at three properties?

Beaver

10:36 AM, 13th March 2024, About 2 months ago

Reply to the comment left by PAUL BARTLETT at 13/03/2024 - 10:23
There are a large number of properties that are now held in limited companies and that includes single properties. For people who want to incorporate their business and claim rollover relief to avoid CGT they need to be spending a significant amount of time on that business for it to qualify. So it's unlikely that a single property would qualify.

But for people who have a portfolio of FHL properties they are running themselves the chances are that they would qualify. So they could just incorporate to avoid CGT and as far as I understand the situation they would be able to deduct all their costs. It's not necessarily expensive to run a limited company.

GlanACC

11:39 AM, 13th March 2024, About 2 months ago

Reply to the comment left by Beaver at 13/03/2024 - 10:36
Good point, even when I had 18 properties I was still only spending around 3 or 4 hours a week managing them. Now I only have 6 (4 in a LTD company) and 2 in a partnership, then the only 'recommended' way of moving the partnership properties was to sell and buy in the LTD company. S24 wasn't a concern as I am mortgage free. It was just too expensive. If you have a large portfolio as I did (then 16 of the properties were in the LTD company) then that is definitely worth it

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