Earlier this month the Chancellor, Rishi Sunak made his summer economic update and among the announcements were some fairly weighty changes which will affect the property market. The big announcement involved a Stamp Duty holiday until March 2021, but there were also details of a grant to help with property insulation, a VAT cut and new spending on infrastructure projects.
We thought we should take a look at these in a little more details; but remember, if you are thinking of selling your property, take a look at some of our properties for sale in Virginia Water and get in touch with a member of our team on 01344 843000 or you can email us.
Stamp Duty Holiday
As we spoke about in our last blog, the stamp duty holiday looks like it will give the propery market a prolonged boost, which in turn will help the economy to recovery. In a nutshell the stamp duty holiday is a freeze on paying stamp duty on any property up to £500,000, saving first time buyers and next home buyers.
If you’re an investor buying an additional property you will pay a flat 3% on top of the standard thresholds.
This means that nationally, 9 out of ten buyers will pay no stamp duty at all, saving them an average of £4,500 and a maximum of £15k. We believe that this move will restore confidence in the market and spur people who were undecided about buying/selling before the lock down into making their move.
Green Homes Grant
We’ve spoken a lot in the past about the need to make your home more energy efficient and kinder to the environment. Now the government is taking things seriously; they are launching the Green Homes Grant scheme. This £2 billion home improvement fund will give homeowners and landlords the opportunity to claim up to two thirds of the cost of the work done to improve their property’s energy efficiency, up to a maximum of £5,000.
This will help homeowners save significant sums of money on their energy bills and is good news for the environment overall. The Government estimates that more than 600,000 homes across England will need upgrading.
VAT Cut
While not a direct benefit to the housing market, the announcement that VAT will be slashed from 20% to 5% on food and non-alcoholic drinks, tourist attractions and accommodation, will most certainly give the general public a little more financial breathing space.
It is important to get the tourism and hospitality industries back up and working as the hospitality sector employ more than 2.4 million people alone! Combining the VAT cut and the new Eat Out to Help Out scheme will help to support the industry and protect jobs.
Infrastructure spending
In this peculiar time of economic stress and unemployment, the Chancellor has decided to bring forward his planned £8.8 billion spend on infrastructure in order to create thousands of new jobs. The works will include hospital upgrades and school maintenance as well as following the Green Grant scheme and making public buildings more energy efficient.
There will also be £100m spent on improving road networks and £1 billion of the total spend has been earmarked to boost local economic recovery in areas it’s most needed. This spending should help employment and boost local housing markets throughout the recovery period.
Get in Touch
If you are thinking of moving to the area, make sure you take a look at our amazing catalogue of properties for sale in Virginia Water and the surrounding areas.
If you’d like to speak to someone about properties to let in Virginia Water, a member of our expert team would be happy to help. You can call us on 01344 843000 or email us. You can also follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn.
image: shutterstock/Lukasz Pajor
