Following the recent 2017 Budget, it has been announced that stamp duty fees will be abolished for first-time buyers.
This relief applies to properties purchased with a value of up to £300,000. Any homes purchased up to £500,000 will not have stamp duty to pay on the first £300,000 and just 5% on anything above this threshold up to £500,000.
The changes to stamp duty have come into force effective immediately, benefitting those people that are ready to buy a property now. This will reportedly benefit 95% of first-time buyers by reducing their stamp duty liability, 80% of those having no liability at all.
In order to benefit from this new relief, a first-time buyer must satisfy the following criteria:-
- A person that has never owned a freehold or leasehold property
- The property must be used as their sole or main residence
- Where there is more than one person purchasing a property in joint names, each person involved must be a first-time buyer to benefit from the relief.
- Residential property owned in any other country will be taken into consideration when deciding whether someone is a first-time buyer.
If you have found the house of your dreams and wish to take advantage of the new stamp duty relief, then contact our highly experienced conveyancing team today. You can call us free on 0808 1685643 or email getmoving@ramsdens.co.uk.