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TODAY'S OTHER NEWS

Sunak tells estate agents: "I'm helping to keep you in a job"

Chancellor Rishi Sunak is taking credit for saving thousands of agency jobs through increased transactions prompted by the stamp duty holiday.

A statement from HM Treasury says the 21.3 per cent rise in transactions in September over August this year “came after the Chancellor announced a stamp duty holiday at the start of July that will last until March next year.”

And it adds the holiday is supporting “hundreds of thousands of jobs in the [property] sector.”

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The statement directly mentions estate agency as one industry benefitting, and goes on: “The move has helped to protect hundreds of thousands of jobs, benefitting businesses across the housing supply chain and beyond, with the Bank of England estimating that households who move home are much more likely to purchase a range of durable goods, such as furniture, carpets or major appliances.”

In addition to agents, the Chancellor claims his move is helping save jobs amongst house builders, tradespeople, DIY stores, removal and cleaning firms.

Sunak himself says: “With a third of Brits [sic] planning to spend savings from the tax break on home improvements and renovations, the temporary stamp duty cut is boosting business and protecting jobs. This ranges from carpenters to cleaners, brickies and decorators, they can all benefit from each sale – helping us to further deliver on our Plan for Jobs.”

The government says the holiday means nine out of 10 people “getting on or moving up the property ladder” will pay no SDLT at all. 

This measure delivers an average saving of £4,500 in SDLT it claims.

The statement concludes by saying: “The government wants people to feel confident to move, to buy, to sell, to renovate, and to improve their homes, driving growth and supporting jobs.”

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    Except the market had already sparked back into life!

    Proper Estate Agent

    Exactly, he should have waited to see what happen. All he did was fuel a middle class move who just tripled the saving and put their house price up....all to be undone next year no doubt in a monster reversal and few sales.

     
  • Mark Walmsley

    All good but I pity the conveyancers on the last Friday in March!

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    Asking prices haven't risen at all.......... Just bringing forward Business. Wait until Apr-May next year to see

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    so what

     
    Proper Estate Agent

    They have, we had a spate of sellers with agreed deals in Feb, relisting at more money. One was SSTC at 850 in March after weeks on the market, so he relisted it and it sold for 920 in July. That will probably get reversed in March 21.

     
  • Al Mac

    1. As we saw in Q1, demand was there already. Yes, helpful, but let's see what rabbit he pulls out of the hat in March 2021

  • Algarve  Investor

    Brand Rishi takes credit for an awful lot. An undoubtedly smooth and slick operator, but his big challenge will now come as he tries to steer the UK through the worst recession in modern times with the possibility of a no-deal Brexit to compound things. As others have said, it's easy to be popular when you're giving away money, but his star has fallen somewhat with the realisation that the Eat Out to Help Out scheme probably had a direct connection to the virus spreading more quickly again, and also his late and delayed reaction to helping those in tiers 2 and 3.

    He's clearly positioning himself for the top job, and is far more capable than the current joker we have in charge, but we also need to remember that he's Cummings man, and has previously been an avid supporter of Boris.

    Where Javid was unwilling to have advisers chosen for him, and a closer connection between No 10 and the Treasury, Sunak was more than happy to play ball to get his big promotion.

  • adrian duthie

    Typical bull***t from this bunch of incompetent charlatans in charge of running the country. Transactions may be up in one month but are down across the whole of the year on the lamentable level of 2019 (caused primarily by the opportunist Johnson and his Brextremists failure to negotiate a good deal for the UK)

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    • 23 October 2020 09:34 AM

    Best deal is No Deal

    The UK doesn't need any deal with the useless EU which is a giant protectionist racket.

    The sooner we are with a No Deal the better.
    The UK can easily live without German cars and French wine.

    No Deal holds no horrors for the UK but it does for the EU.

    They'll soon have to destroy their fishing fleets like the UK had to do causing devastation in those UK fishing communities.

    Well now the EU will have to suffer like the Brits did 40 years ago.

    No Deal is opportunity not a problem.

     
    Algarve  Investor

    If you think no deal will impact the EU27 more than the UK, you are very sadly mistaken.

    I'm not sure you quite understand what being on WTO rules means - huge tariffs for a wide range of businesses; further uncertainty on top of Covid.

    And a deal will have to be done at some point, won't it? The EU is our biggest trading partner, and any number of new trade deals with Japan, the US and Australia won't be enough to make up for that.

     
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    Totally agree with you Paul. No deal is the only way forward. Not sure I can agree with you though about the German cars (I drive a Mercedes and love it to bits!) and drink gallons of French red wine every week since lockdown!

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    • 23 October 2020 10:54 AM

    Yep but if prices are more then you'll find other non-EU cars and wines to drink.
    I'm partial to Chilean wines.
    If every German car and dealership disappeared it would be no loss.

    WTO regulations hold no horrors.
    Ultimately other countries will realise it is in their interests to arrange deals.

    The German economy relies on people like you to buy their cars.

    Not for nothing do car manufacturers refer to the UK as

    'Treasure Island'


    Tariffs will be dropped by the EU and the UK.

    The EU is just making a noise as it doesn't want any other countries leaving the EU.

     
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    Agree with Paul and John.........lets do it :)
    Between 1800 and 1915 Britain had no "treaty" with any EU countries and you know what.......GB was one of the wealthiest countries in the world.......bring it on !
    The Algarve Investor is worried about getting back into the UK and having to pay a Wealth Tax as a non EU citizen in Portugal no doubt :)

    Kristjan Byfield

    I think you should rename your account Spitting Image because this is beyond parody. So are you expecting the UK to start invading foreign nations to build a colony again because the exploitation of most of those countries back then was the source of 'our' wealth. Not forgetting capitalism/consumerism not being a thing. Oh yeah and there wasn't a really minor insignificant thing back then- you might have heard of it or not I'm not sure- I think it's called the internet.

     
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    • 23 October 2020 11:22 AM

    Yep many EU countries will miss the expat currency.

    I'm sure there will be enlightened EU countries that will see it is in their financial interests to welcome expats.

    We shall see what happens in the new year.

  • Matthew Payne

    He is lucky he kept his job yesterday with that spectacular u-turn on the Job Support Scheme, that was so badly misjudged only a few weeks ago, other chancellors have been sacked for less . I am surprised he is therefore crowing about an equally misjudged decision to fan the flames of an already active housing market, to the point where conveyancers can't cope with the volumes, lenders don't like the volumes, surveyors don't like the overnight house price inflation and social distancing delays service provider activity. Not a good recipe for swollen pipelines that all are in a desperate hurry to complete. I wonder if he will take the credit for the potential cliff edge in the next few weeks when people realise they are no longer able to or want to proceed as they have run out of time.

  • Kristjan Byfield

    All these stats always ignore the lockdown and therefore pent-up demand. Comparing this Sept to last Sept is daft unless you align this with stats that this May was down X% on last May- again utterly pointless. The grandstanding by Rishi and his cohorts is laughable- Id love to understand how many bona fide sales were created exclusively as a result of the SDLT holiday- I would imagine the number to be very small indeed. I also expect them to accept the blame for the cliff edge this will create end of March- will he take sole responsibility for the array of transactions that collapse on 1st April? Or is that (April) Fool(i)s(h) of me!?

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