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Penalties on landlords betray Tory ethos, says party member

Some policies towards landlords show how the government has lost its conservative ethos of supporting businesses and being the party of low taxes. 

Rosalind Beck - a campaigning landlord, Conservative member, and long-time critic of government changes to landlords’ taxes - has written in The Article that recent proposals regarding possible tax changes affecting the private rental sector owe more to a populist agenda than to traditional Tory philosophy.

Beck argues against recent proposals - said to have the ear of Chancellor Rishi Sunak - to make the Capital Gains Tax on additional homes higher than before. There is speculation this will be one of a number of proposals at next month’s Budget. 

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She writes: “It is … not clear whether they have any handle at all on the taxes private landlords already pay. I can help put them in the picture by outlining some of the property taxes landlords already face, even before proposed Budget hikes, using the following example of someone with one rental property. Remember, the majority of landlords are in this category.”

She then gives a detailed account of her own buy to let purchase, 20 years ago, and how taxes have eroded the profitability of the exercise - including, possibly, how future increases in CGT may diminish profits further.

“The amount of CGT demanded by the state also takes no account of inflation” she says, stating that between 2001 and 2021 annual inflation of 2.73 per cent would produce a cumulative price increase of 71 per cent - thus making CGT on capital appreciation particularly unfair as it does not take into account inflation. 

Beck continues to make a strident case for reforming taxes for the private rental sector, and backing off on regulatory changes - including recent eviction bans and the threat of £30,000 fines for contraventions of local licensing. 

She concludes her article by saying: “The Conservatives would do well to realise that if they go ahead with this, landlords will take whatever evasive action they can. Many will batten down the hatches and not sell up for years — in which case the government will receive only a fraction of the tax predicted.”

 

And she makes a radical suggestion: “Why not do the opposite instead and treat landlords fairly? Why not bring back taper relief, exempt inflationary gains and 'simplify' tax by getting rid of the eight per cent CGT levy introduced by the vindictive George Osborne? Such a positive approach to taxing landlords would be likely to increase sales and probably bring in far more revenue than a huge tax hike ever would.”

You can read the full piece here.

Want to comment on this story? If so...if any post is considered to victimise, harass, degrade or intimidate an individual or group of individuals on any basis, then the post may be deleted and the individual immediately banned from posting in future.

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    It’s an excellent article, very well written and argued and one the Government should take heed of.

  • George Dawes

    This tory government are at the behest of their backers and advisers ... look them up and you’ll soon see what their mo is ... helping private landlords is at the very bottom of their list

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    We've known for a long time that we're not going to get any help, quite the opposite, so we have to help ourselves by refusing to rent to the vulnerable and increasing rents still further.

     
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    • 09 February 2021 09:01 AM

    Exactly, and as I do, I will add to that amount an extra 15% of the increases and extra costs to offset the administration and hassle.

    So, congratulations to Mr. Politician and to Mr. Councilor. All of you have managed, I must say, with exemplary ease, a way to get the people you are supposed to be helping, to actually never be able to afford your goal for them.

    Too add, you also seem to do just that with never ending consistency, ease and stupidity.

    Congratulations. Enjoy your £100's of thousands in salaries, and your 6 bed detached houses, vast pensions, enormous expenses, and untold perks and the bribes you all receive.

    We are not stupid, and we see what you do.

    One day.....You will ALL suffer for it, and for me it will be sweet retribution.

    Enjoy it as long as you can. And that will be a much shorter time than you might think.

     
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    David, put your big boy pants on and stop vowing revenge on everyone who annoys you. You're not Maximus Decimus Meridius.

     
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    • 09 February 2021 15:21 PM

    They do not annoy me, they are just morally deficient people though and through.
    All of them.

     
  • PossessionFriendUK PossessionFriend

    The whole Tory Govt have gone WOKE like a lot of society. They've changed from the party of Business, to the party who'll implement anything to get enough votes to get into Govt and an ' Earner '

    So many examples of the Tories taking over lefty policies. Their latest one was the Debt Breathing space, impacting Millions of business creditors. They will surely give business and landlords a Tax trouncing to pay for their friends dodgy contracts.
    Farage and the party of Reform is the only hope.

    Algarve  Investor

    Haha! Reform UK which no-one's ever heard of, led by professional spiv and contrarian Farage, who has lost any relevance whatsoever since Trump lost power and Brexit happened.

    He'll be back, stirring the pot and attacking the woke, but only for his own ego, to get his name back in the papers, his face back on the TV and his voice on the radio.

    A man who couldn't even get elected in Thanet, a Brexit hotbed, has no chance of doing anything. He caved in to Boris at the last election, didn't he?

    He's a shameless opportunist and will do whatever is right for Farage. You can be sure he's got an EU passport through his kids or his ex-German wife. The world's biggest hypocrite is not the answer, not by a long chalk. You'd be better off getting behind Laurence Fox and whatever that entitled toff is calling his 'transformative' party these days.

    Woke is just a term chucked around by the likes of Fox and Farage for things they don't like. Like snowflake.

     
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    Buying houses and getting the poor to pay your mortgage is not a business.

     
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    Well Lee, not all landlords have mortgages, none of my tenants are paying my mortgage, and never have been, I bought all my properties for cash through good old fashioned hard work, maybe if your '' poor'' were to try '' hard work'' they could be buying properties for cash

     
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    Andrew, that's a ridiculously vacuous statement. Its not a lack of 'hard work' that means a lot of people cannot afford to buy a house with cash. The average house price in England is around 8 times higher than the average salary (£236,000 average house price, £31,000 average salary). Someone could work for 8 years, not spend a penny and just about afford to buy a house outright.

    Yet, predictions suggest house prices will increase closer to £280,000 on average, so they almost certainly wouldn't be able to afford one by the time they've saved up.

    Its a ridiculous suggestion that the average person could through just more 'hard work' or 'not buying a coffee' could suddenly afford to buy a house. There are more broad issues, including an increasing demand due to people living longer and staggering rates of net migration, decreasing supply partially because foreign investors by properties and leave them empty which artificially inflates prices and mainly because no government has done a competent job at building homes at anywhere near the necessary rate, a cautious mortgage market and stagnant wages.

    Your smug self-congratulation does nothing to resolve an issue which is creating a generation of renters, who represent an increasing voting bloc and will therefore get more and more concessions, restricting the ability for landlords to operate in the market.

     
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    • 10 February 2021 11:29 AM

    James.......Rubbish - When I bought my first property, it was 10.2 time more than my then annual GROSS salary!

    And I did it by sheer hard work and deprivation and an attitude to make it happen.

    Today's WOKES just want it all given to them and without any responsibility to make things happen to their betterment.

    It is true that very hard work pays off. And Starbucks should not feature in that effort, and nor should ski and summer holidays.

     
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    James Smith - Surely you not suggesting that someone should by rights afford the average cost of £236k as their first property. Maybe they should cut their cloth like we all did and start at say £100k plenty of property to buy at that level. It just might not be in top condition that todays millennials demand on moving in. Just some application and elbow grease.
    As for your example of £236k a couple with a saved deposit could easily afford to buy that? But ah maybe they just dont want to make sacrifices get a second evening job if need be, go without to save for a deposit!

     
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    There is no "Left" or "Right" anymore. It's all "Left" now. We are heading towards communism disguised as socialism. "YOU WILL OWN NOTHING AND BE HAPPY!" (Klaus Schwab, World Economic Forum, the Davos Billionaires Club). There is no competition in communism, everything belongs to the state and their cronies. Almost all small, medium and some big business will go bust in the next 10 years. Forget choice, Monopolies is going to be the word of the decade..... Everyone will be on benefit and if you don't cut it with your social credit score and don't go shopping where we tell you too and spend your money when we tell you to then we will take it away from your digital currency account (say "Hello" to infinite negative rates). Sorry to be the party pooper here, but you need to prepare. Dump your low income BTL properties, get 5yr or longer fixed mortgages and buy AU/AG/BTC! The only way the governments of this world can eradicate their massive debt bubbles is to go into hyperinflation!

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    Waa waa waa. Please sell your properties now.

     
  • PossessionFriendUK PossessionFriend

    There is a big and increasing uprising against Woke - Cancel Culture see Counterweight, Alex The Voice of Reason, Katie Hopkins, David Vance AltNewsMedia.com The Spectator, Andrew Neil's new GB News, the IEA, Telegraph etc etc

    As for Farage, he was responsible for waking up the British population to the evils of the EU and leading to the referendum. The rest is history. He is also bringing to notice the shameful Immigration ( with its Terrorism, virus etc ) into this country.

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    Janet, I agree with the exception of the next 10 years, that's too optimistic can we revise that to 2 years.

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    I agree with that. "The Great Reset" has already started and will go into full throttle in the next 2-4 years and finally finished around 2030. This has happened 48 times every 80-100 years. (Book- The 4th Turning by William Strauss; Youtube Mike Maloney Hidden Secrets of Money). Businesses - don't expect any help from the government. This time they are not just happy milking the cow, they actually want to kill it! Buckle up!

     
  • George Dawes

    Janet is 100% correct , sadly ...

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    Well written Dr Ross , If the Government continue this war on Landlords we will all have to find a way to sell up, or risk one bad tenant bankrupting you. I did write something very similar to My MP Last week. No reply yet.

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    I did write to my MP. George Freeman, and got a reply, kind words and bull sh*t, but I really wasn't expecting anything else.

     
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    I met with George Freeman at a private dinner (a Tory fund-raiser for some of the biggest/best-connected LLs), even handing him a file of papers on the raw, honest truth of being a LL (things I don’t think he’d have known) and he wasn’t in the slightest bit interested.

     
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    Back in 2015 when George Osborne fired the gun on what has been 6 years of relentless landlord bashing, I exchanged a number of emails with my MP pointing out that the costs would all fall in the tenants shoulders, as well as increased homelessness. I referred to the similar Irish experiment that resulted in just that. Economics 101. He simply regurgitated the Treasury nonsense about no impact on rents, improved housing blah blah blah. I reminded him of those exchanges recently (rents more than 50% up here, the homeless teams in the council desperate for landlords to help clear the backlog - er ... no thanks). Still awaiting a response

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    Well said Andrew Townshend.....people expect everything for minimum effort these days! I built up my portfolio from the sweat of my back and focusing and saving for the next deposit to invest in the next prroperty.....it CAN be done. If people don't want to graft to get on in life, that's their choice but they have NO right to expect us hardworking individuals to give them free/cheap homes. I'm running a business (I wish HMRC would recognise that) not a charity!!!

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    • 10 February 2021 11:33 AM

    Of course you are 120% correct.

     
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    Can we not have sensible debate without getting sh***y with each other.
    This place is getting worse than Twitter! ;0
    If there is bitterness in your tone, you will never win the day, whatever your narrative.

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