2nd
Aug 2017
Good news for landlords as many will no doubt applaud Iain Duncan Smith's comments for being in total opposition of the draconian buy-to-let legislation, introduced by George Osborne in his former role as chancellor.
Duncan Smith slams Osborne for his anti-landlord stance and praises landlords as "a significant provider of the additional housing we need”.
In his recent Conservative Home article, he wrote that now is the time to "reconsider the way we treat private landlords who buy houses to rent”.
He highlighted the danger of the measures as many BTL landlords have decided not to increase their portfolios because of the tax changes that the Tories introduced, when more homes are an absolute necessity in the private rental sector.
Duncan Smith wrote: “A large number of them [private landlords] are talking about no longer buying to let, and they blame it on George Osborne’s decision to impose a stamp duty levy on the purchase of homes to rent, to restrict mortgage interest relief to the basic rate of income tax, and to tax a landlord’s turnover rather than profits.
“This, they believe, has led to private landlords scaling back their operations or even leaving the sector altogether. We should all be concerned about this, because private landlords are a significant provider of the additional housing we need.”
The former Leader of the Tory party, fully appreciates the government's intentions of building 300,000 new houses per year, however he feels it is somewhat unlikely that this target will be achieved within Year One as it simply cannot happen at the 'flick of a switch'.
He wrote: “We won’t be able to provide all the housing in the medium term through aggressive building programmes alone. We will need other sources of accommodation, as well."
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