Stamp Duty loss: 70,000 agreed sales will miss deadline

A new forecast suggests 70,000 buyers will miss the March 31 stamp duty holiday deadline.

Zoopla has undertaken a new analysis to measure the impact of the holiday as a whole, and to assess the housing market in the past year. 

The portal says that when the holiday was announced in July many buyers already in the pipeline obviously benefitted. 

It says the stamp duty liability from sales agreed in England after the first lockdown ended in May was £7.8 billion, not including the additional homes three per cent stamp duty surcharge. 

For sales agreed between May and the end of the calendar year, some 600,000 escaped stamp duty - either because properties were exempt to begin with, or they were under the holiday’s £500,000 threshold. 

In total these will each save an average £4,660 on stamp duty - providing they complete before March 31, of course.

The 140,500 sales agreed over £500,000 all saved £15,000 each – that £2.1 billion in total – but these sales would still be liable for £2.9 billion for the stamp duty levied on prices over £500,000. On top of that, there will be the three per cent surcharge for some properties. 

Richard Donnell, insight and research director at Zoopla, says: “A surge in sales at higher house prices in 2020 would have created a major tax liability for UK home buyers but the stamp duty holiday looks set to deliver £5 billion in full or partial savings for 740,000 buyers over 2020 and the first quarter of 2021. 

“Many will have already completed their sale or will be completing shortly but for some the risk of missing the deadline remains.”