Fall Fail

In yesterday’s Autumn Statement Philip Hammond had the perfect opportunity to listen to the property professionals and remove the onerous SDLT increases brought in by the previous chancellor George Osbourne. We were disappointed however, though once again not entirely surprised, that the Chancellor did not reform stamp duty at the upper end of the market, or reverse the extra 3% recently introduced on secondary homes and BTL landlords.

The government also missed a trick to bring regulation to letting agents by creating a standard fee and instead opted to ban lettings fees charged to tenants altogether.  Clearly the government has failed to get to grips with the industry, as they don’t seem to realise that agents are not able to afford to absorb all these extra costs. They will now have to be passed on to landlords who will in turn increase their rents.

We can only turn to the immortal words of Sir Winston Churchill, at times like this, and keep buggering on.

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