Philip Hammond has a history as a property entrepreneur – he set up a residential property development firm, Castlemead, which went on to build doctors’ surgeries and had an annual turnover of over £10m.
Surely, at last, we have a Chancellor who understands the value and contribution of property to UK PLC.
The auspices aren’t good, however. Recent Tory Chancellors have been happy to hack off their mates by taxing their earnings and milking their assets, particularly those made of bricks.
But now, there are new political imperatives.
Most would agree that building more houses and better social care to unblock hospital beds are worth paying for. They are not cheap and given swingeing cuts to date the hunt will be on for more, easy targets.
Whispers about more second home/investor charges are rife and, despite some enjoyable banter on social media from commentators arguing about whether the SDLT take is up or down, I wouldn’t put it past this administration to find the urge irresistible to pull the teat and keep milking the property sector.
I’ve banged on about this for years and want to say it again JUST in case any politician is listening.
The top end of the London property market is not a joke. Yes, it’s an easy target and you’ll not lose many votes, BUT the amount of money such buyers spend in the wider economy is, and always has been, disproportionately huge.
Traditional property markets work by those in smaller properties needing to move pushing the chain all the way up. In London, people move because they want to live in what they perceive are better areas and will pay handsomely to be able to tell their friends.
If you choke off the top, you stop the chain all the way down – i.e. London is uniquely pulled from the top up. Cut the string that supports it, as is being done right now with some staggeringly dim and regressive taxing, and you risk the whole shooting match.
Martin Luther King said: “We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.”
Tomorrow, Hammond delivers his Budget: will it be a case of disappointment or hope?
You would have thought George Osborne’s Pie In The Sky (pun intended) attempt at ‘reforming’ the property market would have been discarded as the ridiculous vote catching smoke and mirrors trick that wouldn’t actually work by the current Chancellor. But alas it just goes to show that it doesn’t matter who sits at the table and wears the robes of office it is the powers behind the scenes that call the shots.
There may be a ‘diluted’ version of what has been threatened but if i were a betting man I would put my tax bill on any dilution being minimal.
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