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With the UK on course for a Conservative government the property market looks set to continue to be prosperous.
What are the Conservative governments residential property policies?
• Everybody is aware that there is a severe shortage of houses in the UK and each party has put forward their proposals. By 2020, the Conservatives have promised to build 200,000 starter homes for first-time buyers, more garden cities and a further 400,000 new units from brownfield land.
• The Conservatives have recently announced that they will extend Margaret Thatcher’s famous Right to Buy policy and allow 1.3 million council tenants to buy their council homes at a heavily discounted price. The proposed discount will be worth 35% for a house after a housing association tenant has been in the house for three years with the value of the discount rising 1% for every extra year the tenant has rented in the public sector. In the case of a flat, the discount will be worth 50% after the first three years, rising by 2% each year afterwards.
• The Conservatives are pledging to extend their Help to Buy scheme to get more first time buyers on the housing ladder. This includes introducing a new ISA whereby the government will contribute £50 for every £200 that aspiring homeowners save up towards a deposit for their first home.
The move will mean that someone saving up a ten per cent deposit on the average first-time buyer property valued at £150,000 will now have to save £12,000 and the government will chip in £3,000 more. The tax break will be capped at £3,000.
• Perhaps most significantly the conservatives are saying NO to mansion tax which was proposed by labour and would have been payable on point of purchase on properties priced at £2,000,000 and above.
