Reconsider the new Dividend Tax for small businesses - Gouvernment Petition

[garethevans1986]

Signed and Shared.

[smalldog]

Sure, that's superficially correct, but it's missing the point. Prices reflect supply vs. demand. Where you have a mountain of BTL speculators (on very favourable funding terms), there's excess demand. In other words, housing starts to behave like any other asset class and many of those that would otherwise buy are unable to do so. Essentially, there needs to be a level playing field in terms of funding (expect that soon from the FPC) and gov't needs to introduce policies that encourage long-term investment, rather than speculation, which generally implies less retail investment in BTL. I don't particularly like the way the gov't has approached this with the 3% residual stamp duty and the reduction in relief on mortgage interest, but a rebalancing is definitely needed.

The terms dont favour BTL owners, for a start the mortgages arent as good, higher int rates and lower LTV's. I agree there needs to be balance, what I think has skewed the argument is the number of foreign investors buying up vast numbers of London properties and creating a south east bubble. Personally I dont see anything wrong in having a few BTL's, hey my son or daughter might end up living in one I own.

The stupidity of it all though is that if you run BTL as a Ltd commercial enterprise none of the new rules apply. So it doesnt hit the people that own 50 or 100 running it as a business, it just hits the small man who is trying to plan for the future. Any who do own a vast number and are cash rich wont mind setting up an Ltd, paying the CGT and avoiding this all together.

For the vast number of contractors who earn above average wage can you suggest an alternative investment strategy? After all we dont live in a communist state so investing is ok. Gold is knackered, Pensions are at best poor performers at worst you lose it all, savings have shockingly bad returns and ISA's have a limit.

[jamesbrown]

The terms dont favour BTL owners, for a start the mortgages arent as good, higher int rates and lower LTV's. I agree there needs to be balance, what I think has skewed the argument is the number of foreign investors buying up vast numbers of London properties and creating a south east bubble. Personally I dont see anything wrong in having a few BTL's, hey my son or daughter might end up living in one I own.

The stupidity of it all though is that if you run BTL as a Ltd commercial enterprise none of the new rules apply. So it doesnt hit the people that own 50 or 100 running it as a business, it just hits the small man who is trying to plan for the future. Any who do own a vast number and are cash rich wont mind setting up an Ltd, paying the CGT and avoiding this all together.

For the vast number of contractors who earn above average wage can you suggest an alternative investment strategy? After all we dont live in a communist state so investing is ok. Gold is knackered, Pensions are at best poor performers at worst you lose it all, savings have shockingly bad returns and ISA's have a limit.

The MMR excluded BTL investors, so it isn't a level playing field. The problem is that, for every person with reasonable intentions (you, I dare say), there are five others that are speculating on a property bubble. In terms of financial stability, it makes far more sense for SMEs and larger corporates to be investing in BTL than retail investors. Retail investors are typically chasing a pension (i.e. several properties) or a quick turnaround on asset appreciation, which exaggerates the existing propensity for boom/bust in UK property. However, the irony of the current gov't policies is that, in the short-term, they may produce the herd departure from BTL that they're looking to avoid in the longer term.

Sure, there are millions of sensible investment strategies across a whole variety of asset classes that don't have the same social consequences as housing bubbles. Most retail BTL investors are woefully over-exposed to UK housing, given that they probably own their own house and have several others.

[d000hg]

There will be coalition of Labour with SNP in next Govt - for the good of the country to get rid of Tories. SNP tax policies (50% tax) were much milder compared to what Tories have already done.

No they weren't. Not for the majority.

I'm rather sick of the "I don't like X, I know I'll start a petition" mentality.