To think people who own more than 3 properties should have a special tax applied to them?

[Calltheguards]

I'm just thinking with the housing crisis, should people really own more than 3 properties? I would assume it's a property portfolio and used to exploit renters. AIBU to think there should be a special tax applied to property owners who own more than 3 properties? Maybe tax them at a really high rate to discourage people from hoarding property.

public service of providing good quality reasonably priced housing

When you buy an asset, you aren’t intending to perform a public service.

It’s an asset just like anything else

People who earn enough money and can afford to buy multiple properties are responsible for those who don’t earn enough !

Couldn't sell at all, or couldn't sell for the price you wanted?

So people can’t choose what to sell their own property for?

Socialists are fucking batshit. Like, batshit!

They’d have you queuing for toilet roll.

"OK, that doesn't sound as if it's working on the face of it."

Yeah, no shit.

You think it's not happening in the UK too. It absolutely is.

I would favour the following for creating new housing on already built-on land: allow housing megacorps to compulsory purchase already built-on land if they think they can extract more value out of it than the current owners. (Their plan would have to be approved as in the public interest by the local authority, and the existing property owners would have to receive compensation of more than the before-redevelopment value, so that people would in effect regard it as a bonus to have the property taken from then.)

One land-use problem this would solve is that while it is relatively easy to subdivide land, it's more difficult to assemble a set of adjacent parcels into a single plot to serve a big project. (I'm thinking of some of the extraordinary multi-story developments I've seen in Singapore. There's lots of drab areas of east London that would be improved by being flattened and replaced with 21st century high-rises. To be fair, there are lots of high-rises going up now, even without the help of my proposed measures. But if we redevelop at the rate the Chinese have recently thrown up cities, we could double the housing available in London in a decade or two, without using any new land. And that's only by flattening the less nice bits, I'm not suggesting flattening Mayfair or building over Hyde Park.)

Google "The Interlace" development in Singapore and tell me something like that wouldn't be a better use of precious land than the average terraced streets in zone 3 or 4.

They know the answer too

You got enough tin foil for your hat?

I find it hard to believe that some people think 'older' people who bought a large house many years ago should now be forced to move to a smaller one just because some twit with loads of kids wants a bigger house! Do you not think that is unfair - they have bought (presumably with a mortgage) and lived in that house with all their memories? Why on earth should they be made to move out?

Assuming the OP means one to live in and two to rent out, how would it help if we had twice the number of landlords just renting out one property? Same number of rented properties, but just more landlords. I don't get it?

let those landlords place the properties they cannot afford back for sale, let them be acquired and fixed at lower prices by the council via the new tax fund and allow for the social housing stock to increase

Oh dear. You seem to have missed the point if they put them back for sale they aren't paying the "new tax". 😳😳😳

Wanting fairness is pure envy and rancour?

That would depend on what exactly was wanted

Personally I want the kind of fairness which involves LLs being registered and the worst driven out - I liked the idea of some sort of tribunal for grievances too, just as I see the argument for sensible rent controls and several other things

But in many of these posts there's little recognition of balancing needs - it's so often just toddler-like cries of "not faaaiiirrr", which hardly seem to lend anything to the issue

Where is the tax to fund buying these houses coming from, @calltheguards, if your potential tax payers are the ones selling them back?

Oh and to top it off if I do get a buyer then we will pay CGT too.

Only on gains, obviously, and only on gains over the annual allowance. You seem to be saying you will sell at a loss, so in that case there would be no CGT - happy days!

You realise not everyone has time/access to education, right? Not everyone has the capital either.

Don't be ridiculous I'm not anticipating a six month course in researching landlord or house purchase rules. People have to make time for everything, it takes a few hours to learn and gain this knowledge.

Maybe people don't have the capital, that's understandable but not people don't have the time to research.

Or does also being a landlord mean I e got 26 hours in my day and you'd like me to have only 22. My time is just as limited as everyone else's.

The Tory's have brought in various tax changes to discourage landlords through higher taxation already.

1. Additional stamp duties on 2+ houses;
2. Reduction of tax relief on mortgage interest;
3. Restriction on main residence relief for CGT;
4. Restriction on lettings relief for CGT.
5. Higher CGT rates on domestic property compared with other assets.

That's quite an impressive list of higher taxes when everyone thinks that Tories are the party of the rich - makes you wonder why Labour didn't increase taxes on landlords during their 13 years of power.

sorry I shouldn't have to sell at a loss
Do you think you should be protected from losing money, really?

So the PP should sell at a loss according to some posters on here. How do they expect her to any outstanding mortgage?

God there are some strange people on MN!

You realise not everyone has time/access to education, right? Not everyone has the capital either.

People don't seem to have problems spending time on Facebook or other social media, but can't find time to research to improve their lives!

You're bringing common sense into it again, Bluntness ... surely you know by now that's not always welcome on LL threads?

They do already. They pay additional stamp duty tax when purchased sbf they pay tax on the properties they let.

And not sbf

I have several friends who rent out properties ime there are more bad tenants than bad landlords, evicting non rent paying tenants is a nightmare and v expensive, some hand back the properties absolutely trashed. I would never be a landlord.

OP - you have what you want as we are already taxed at a higher rate

Mortgage payment relief has been reduced and will soon be gone completely so tax payments are much higher as we have to pay them on gross income rather than net
We have to pay extra stamp duty, no matter how low the property price is
Some of us have agency fees, accountant fees etc.
We have much higher standards to come up to than owned houses - minimum energy efficiency levels, annual gas safe checks, smoke alarms, carbon monoxide indicators, insurance

After 3 redundancies in a row for DH we decided to use the money to invest in property and I am not a parasite or a wanker for doing this!

Our tenants pay under market rate and are not in a position to buy, some have been with us for over 10 years so can't be unhappy
I don't know what you would want me to do with them all if I sell - just chuck them out?!

Stop being jealous for gods sake. They have to pay tax on these you know?

It takes an average 3 years to build social housing so this "plan" has some, ehm, issues.

Super tax landlords - > landlords start selling at large numbers lowering prices to up to 10% - > people who couldn't save 5k for deposit, still can't save 4.5k (example from my area, understandably prices differ by region) - > these people need somewhere else to live, but landlord is selling - > available social housing is 2.5 years away from being finished- > everyone is fucked.

Did I miss something?

We have a local GP who is not shy about running to the media to highlight social injustices - regularly in the local media with local headteachers going on about poor housing, poverty, etc.

Yet, he has 17 buy to let properties (let out at market value) and has set up his own limited company (sharing profits with his wife who isn't a GP) to provide locum services to his own GP practice, thus avoiding tax and NIC!

Hypocrite!

What benefit are they providing for society?

They are providing homes (yes at a cost) for those not in a position to buy. People like my DD and her housemates who are renting so they can go to university. Where should they live while studying? It’s no good saying “with their parents”, the only sensibly commutable university from our home doesn’t offer the course DD is on.

People sometimes have to move somewhere temporarily for their work. Who is going to buy a house to live in for a six month placement?

No I’m not a landlord. I don’t have any friends who are landlords but I do know there is a need for them.

People like to bang on about landlords paying tax but the bottom line is that rent seeking isn't a productive endeavour. You're not creating anything that wouldn't be there anyway. There are significant opportunity costs to people owning multiple properties.

Yes people can do what they want with their money but if there's anything we can do to encourage people to put their resources into enterprise, into the future, into genuine innovation, then we should be doing it.