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Graham Awards

TODAY'S OTHER NEWS

Osborne's property-related Autumn Statement measures

- From April 2016 buy to let landlords and people buying second or holiday homes will have to pay an additional 3.0 per cent stamp duty surcharge, predicted to raise £1 billion by 2021;

- £2.3 billion to be paid directly to developers to build starter homes for sale to first time buyers who will receive 20 per cent discounts. These homes will be capped at £450,000 in London and £250,000 elsewhere;

- Another £4 billion will help build 135,000 so-called ‘Help to Buy: Shared Ownership’ homes for households earning less than £80,000 across the UK or £90,000 within Greater London;

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- Some £200m to help create 10,000 new homes to let that tenants can live in for five years at sub-market rents while they save for a deposit. They will then be given the ‘first right’ to buy the home;

- Restrictions on shared ownership to be removed and planning system reformed to deliver more homes;

- The introduction of a London-specific Help to Buy scheme to offer interest-free loan worth up to 40 per cent of the value of a newly built home;

- An additional £400m to help build 8,000 specialist homes for older people or those with disabilities;

- Five housing associations from today in a pilot programme allowing tenants the right to buy their properties with discounts;

- From 2019 those private market sellers of second homes and investment properties are likely to be expected to pay their capital gains tax within 30 days of completion of their sale.

  • James Ferguson

    Few people are mentioning the one line announcement on page 74 of the Autumn statement about Mr. Osborne's plan to try once again to privatise the Land Registry.

    The Land Registry registers the ownership of land and property in England and Wales. Then once land or property is registered the Land Registry records any ownership changes, mortgages or leases that affect it. They provide owners with a land title that is underpinned by the state.

    The Land Registry pays millions into the Treasury each year and costs the tax payer nothing.

    Do we want to hand that responsibility over to a private sector company to make money for them and their shareholders and possibly cost home buyers dearly?

    The Government tried to privatise the land Registry 18 months ago and an 110,000 signature petition helped the campaign to get it stopped.

    Another petition was started yesterday at https://you.38degrees.org.uk/p/save-land-reg and it has already collected over 2,000 signatures.

  • Rob  Davies

    Osborne tries to privatise everything, so that's no big surprise.

    Good to see there is a petition against it. As you say, The Land Registry does a vital job while costing us nothing. But if there's money to be made by placing it into private hands, the Tories will try and make it so.

  • Jon  Tarrey

    @James Ferguson - Ah, very interesting. This has certainly been glossed over by the mainstream media. Glad to see there is a petition to save it. It worked last time, should work again. As we've seen in the last 24 hours, this government is becoming very good at climbing down over unpopular policies that get scorned by nearly everyone.

    As for the rest, it's nothing we've not heard before. They've been banging on about starter homes and affordable homes since well before the election, but no action has actually been taken. And, of course, the revival of Right to Buy is an absolute disaster, as anyone with half a brain cell could tell you. "We've not got enough social housing as it stands, George." "OK, right, well you know what the solution is, don't you? Get the housing association to sell more of its stock off. Eventually, it will make its way into the hands of some rich investor, the very people we stand for."

    Despite all the words and promises, the reality when it comes to the government's record on housebuilding is that it doesn't hold up to scrutiny. So forgive me if I'm a tad cynical about all these new "proposals".

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