Category Archives: viewpoint

Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, it’s off to work we go…

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As estate agents offices open up again around the country, we need to adjust to a brave, new post-virus world.

The current ‘lockdown affair’ has been tragic, absurd and surreal. However, one unexpected side effect has been that everyone has had time to reflect on their lives and discern what is truly worthwhile. The difference between the price of everything and the value of nothing, as Oscar Wilde might say.

So as we come blinking into the sunlight, it’s an opportune time to examine the seismic macroeconomic issues which are rumbling away under our feet, at this very moment. Continue reading →

Time to take a wrecking ball to the Stamp Duty Escalator and let the markets fly free at last

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For goodness sake Mr. Sunak, take a wrecking ball to the Stamp Duty Escalator and let the markets fly free at last… the Treasury needs the revenue, retail spending needs the stimulus as does the UK economy

What an absolute shower! Thanks to the latest – most unwanted – Chinese import, which has brought most of the world to its plague-ridden knees, the once-flourishing UK economy is teetering on the edge of a Beachy economic Head and staring into the fiscal abyss. Continue reading →

Budget 2020: Conspicuously absent of any reforms on the parlous SDLT escalator, apart from a much unneeded surcharge for foreign buyers

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Here was a golden opportunity missed by the new Chancellor, to get the Residential Property Market off its knees, by reviewing the Stamp Duty Escalator, imposed by former Chancellor Osborne, in 2014.

According to the OBR (Office for Budget Responsibility), Osborne claimed that the Stamp Duty Receipts in 2014 i.e. £14.5billion would, as a result of his reforms, be £19.5billion in 2020, but instead, turned out to be a paltry £12.5billion.

In effect, that these measures cost the Treasury £1billion in lost tax and was an eye watering 50% prediction error, which is an unacceptable overstatement. Continue reading →