To think an annual property tax is incredibly unfair?

[Itchthescratch]

I come from an area with low house prices. It is great! My friends can generally afford houses even with lower salaries as the earnings:house prices ratio is better. Rents are also lower so they have proportionately more disposable income.

I have moved to a more expensive area where house prices are higher and people have really had to push themselves to buy a property. Salaries are higher but not high enough to make up the difference. They have had to pay more stamp duty , pay more interest and have less disposable income each month.

I am really struggling to understand why my friends in the South should also automatically be paying more property tax under the new proposals being suggested by Burnham supporters? What is the justification? They would love to buy a large detached house for £300k like my friends from home but this isn't possible. It feels like they are being double penalised.

Just to add house prices haven't risen in real terms in the area in live in now for 20 years so the value of my friend's houses is simply money they have paid in.

They already are subject to higher tax. You pay a far higher rate of Stamp Duty and double council tax?

No you’re right, by the time I’ve paid Corporation Tax and personal tax I pay far more than I did as an employee. And I already paid more for my “big expensive” house in the form of stamp duty.
This rhetoric of “the rich” not paying taxes pisses me off just as much as the “poor are lazy” rubbish.

*blackhole

You need to get a new accountant if that’s the case.

My bill would be lower so I am 'all right Jack' lol.

This is nonsense for so many reasons.

People aren't all as geographically mobile as you like to make out. Some (I would argue most) people are tied to areas due to career or family constraints.

Following your logic then we shouldn't be paying for SH in expensive areas for anyone. They should be shipped out to cheaper areas like my hometown which would save a huge amount of money. If they moan we can suggest that if they don't like London price, don't live in London.

No, I don’t. I pay my taxes as I should, no fiddling or loopholes. Because it’s the right thing to do.

Not sure about wealth or assets. Our mortgage is £2K per month, the term is into our 70s and we have very little equity.

We are not young either mid 40s. It took us a long time to 'get on the ladder' after many years of renting. Despite property prices increasing so much, it was still preferable to have our 'own' mortgaged home where we were not subject to other people's plans and could paint walls and put up pictures, get a pet etc.

Our 'plan' has always been to downsize and buy outright when the DC leave home. I don't know how realistic the DC moving out is though...

For the millionth time, your area has expensive services because you live rurally and services are costly to deliver in areas that aren't densely populated. Its also true that you are more likely to have more people depending heavily on local services.

If you live in a deprived area then it's virtually guaranteed that people in your community will be paying much less tax overall than people in London. You are still net beneficiaries from the tax system due to all the things that you benefit from that are funded by national taxation. You are simply being asked to fund your own local services that you and your community are benefiting from. You aren't subsidising London.

So you are advocating tax avoidance now? Your input into this thread has been quite strange.

That post wasn’t about me personally. It was about the disparity between the most deprived and wealthiest parts of the country. Did you even open the link? Nottingham isn’t a rural area nor are Blackpool or Walsall. Getting arsey with me because your argument falls down doesn’t change the facts.

They'll jump through hoops to legitimise tax avoidance while fiercely supporting socialist policies. They are remarkably consistent in their inconsistency.

“They” were merely pointing out that that poster is clearly getting poor financial advice if her assertion is correct. No hoops have been jumped through or opinion given. HTH.

We have taxes that tax harmful practices to disincentives them - gambling, sugar, fags, booze. The additional tax on second homes is one too. It’s damaging to locals wanting to buy a property to have people buy them for second homes, which is why most people have zero sympathy for second home races.

The government has to raise money to spend on taxes (i think it could do with slashing spending but hey) so what’s the best way to do that? We tax a range of areas but taxing assets is thought of as fairer than just taxing income. What’s the best property tax? Taxing property transactions (something good for the economy) or finding some other way of raising taxes?

I understand the increased tax on second homes. The tax on people’s only safe nest feels very different to me.

Yes, taxes have to be raised. But how much tax? We are already raising record amounts of tax. How much does the government need to spend and redistribute?

The long term average tax take in the UK is 24.3% if GDP. It has leapt to 34.2%. This means citizens keep less of their own money. Arguably we are hitting the limit of what the government can spend effectively. It would be better allocated by the people themselves.

I’ve worked in a range of financial institutions and each and every one of the employees in them pays taxes PAYE. Chief exec to cleaner. Financial institutions do not touch tax planning with a barge pole. None of them. Hugely risk averse! Not that the majority of the general public believes a word of this.

I live in and Band F property in London zone 5 and pay £3672 CT (3rd most expensive in London).
In Westminster Band F charge in £1472, so I am paying 2.5 times as much.
Personally I favour a local income tax.
Also there are so many houses with extensions who are not paying any extra CT and that should be revisited because it increases the value.

@Bellic

You don't need to live in any of the other asset you own.

A home is uniquely different from shares, bonds or other investments for that exact reason. That should matter when designing a tax system in a country where people have a legal right to own property.

Of course the Government needs to raise revenue and prices do need to fall. The real question isn't whether property should be taxed, but where the balance lies between covering reasonable costs and raising revenue. Using tax as tool to "discourage" some people from remaining in the homes they already own simply because they don't generate the level of tax revenue the Government feel it is entitled to like is just replacing one shit unfair system with another. The ripple effect will affect many of the people who think they will be winners in the new system.

Your post began Our council tax is substantially more than 0.48% of the alleged value of the property. Of course your point was partially about your own circumstance otherwise why mention it at all?

Each of those councils have specific reasons why their Council tax is high using the specific metrics mentioned in the article you linked. For example, Nottingham Council was declared bankrupt in 2023 arguably due to largely to financial mismanagement. Blackpool has a huge amount of houses in Bands A and B for Council Tax purposes which means that they are barely paying any Council Tax. For context the majority of houses are classified as Band A and residents pay £1.6k or 7% of median income which isn't too far off the percentages in some of the London boroughs that make the top 10 cheapest areas list. If most people are paying relatively low levels of Council tax then the minority on higher bands have to pay more to compensate.

The devil is in the detail!

The thing about taxing property though as opposed to income is that until you sell the property you don't actually know what's it's worth.

Take for example a house in London supposedly worth £1.5 million that would pay around £7.5k in tax each year under the proposals. They come to sell and historic subsidence is found that means the house has lost 20% of its value. They could have been overpaying by £1.5k every year as their house was never worth £1.5 million. Do they get a rebate?

Even now, I have friends looking to sell houses that have been given valuations that are different by hundreds of thousands of pounds. I also have friends that have had to reduce the price of their house by 25% to get a sale. What is a property worth? It really is impossible to say until you've sold it.

"I was merely pointing out that the poster is clearly getting poor financial advice."

So the idea that the only "good" financial advice is advice that minimises tax doesn't really stack up. Tax planning is legal but Pillar Two exists because governments around the world recognised that there is a distinction between sensible tax planning and aggressive tax planning. Whilst it only applies to very large multinational companies, the underlying principle has broader merit.

We have aggressive taxed to change behaviour as @Bellic mentioned. I believe that there should be distinction between sensible taxes and aggressive or punitive taxes when it is your sole home, which is an essential need not just simply another financial asset.

Give it a rest @NorthXNorthWest. Go and hound someone else.

You quoted me, I replied. HTH

Reform adult social care itself should be reviewed as a priority. The bills are sky high and set to increase.

https://www.countycouncilsnetwork.org.uk/news/new-analysis-reveals-two-thirds-of-social-care-commissioning-budgets-are-spent-on-working-age-and-disabled-adults-as-councils-call-for-this-forgotten-group-not-to-be-overlooked

UK councils are spending vast amounts of money on outsourcing and intermediary services related to social housing, namely middlemen property outsourcing (securing temporary housing) and agency staff outsourcing (hiring temporary personnel). I would also add wasting money on rubbish job roles like community care officers.

. Councils are wasting tax payers money at an alarming rate
. Government is trying to put in place stealth taxes on an already stretched to breaking general public
. Social care providers often rely on charging private-paying clients higher rates to remain financially viable, with many losing their homes to pay for it.