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Brokers say property transactions already falling through following SDLT change

ended 30. October 2024

Following the stamp duty hike, several brokers have already had landlord clients either pull out of deals entirely or get on the phone to estate agents to renegotiate prices, putting transactions and chains at risk. One broker, Jack Tutton of SJ Mortgages, has already seen two  landlords pull out of buying additional properties, while another, Kelsey Phillips, Head of Specialist Lending at Arose Finance, said: “Within minutes of the Chancellor announcing the additional surcharge, our investor clients were on the phone to estate agents renegotiating purchase prices lower. The immediacy of this tax hike will be painful for clients in the middle of completions and may cause some chains to collapse. Going forward, increasing the levy to 5% will undoubtedly restrict investment demand and make buy-to-let significantly less attractive to non-professional investors.” Views from whats happening on the front line of the property sector now can be found below.

12 responses from the Newspage community

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Jack Tutton
Director at SJ Mortgages
Within an hour of today’s Budget, we have had two landlords withdraw from their purchases despite being close to completion. Prospective buyers who are planning to let the property are generally the ones supporting the bottom of a chain. The decision that Labour have taken today to increase stamp duty for second properties by 2% with less than 12 hours' notice has, and will, cause many properties chains to fall apart putting the property market on its knees. I am sure more will follow, as landlords cannot stomach yet another increase in the tax they need to pay. The government are also likely to miss out on a lot of tax receipts as a result of these broken chains and a reduction in housing transactions.
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Oli Pearce
Director at My Family Mortgages
The Government had an opportunity here to try and fix the floundering rental landscape. Excluding landlords and pushing them out even further isn't going to help with rental prices. The market needs more landlords to offer properties out to rent. This would increase supply and soften the demand issues, but to do that we need more landlords coming to market, not less. We've already had clients message and say they're going to either renegotiate the price of the property or pull out entirely.
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Kelsey Phillips
Head of Specialist Lending at Arose Finance
Within minutes of the Chancellor announcing the additional surcharge, our investor clients were on the phone to estate agents renegotiating purchase prices lower. The immediacy of this tax hike will be painful for clients in the middle of completions and may cause some chains to collapse. Going forward, increasing the levy to 5% will undoubtedly restrict investment demand and make buy-to-let significantly less attractive to non-professional investors.
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Stephen Perkins
Managing Director at Yellow Brick Mortgages
Many investors in the throws of completing a purchase are now shredding their plans or having to find an extra 2% of the property value with less than 12 hours' notice. This will affect much more than just "non-working" landlords as many of those purchases that will now fall through were part of chains of people moving to their dream homes. I can see less buy-to-let investment, less renovation projects and, as the landlord sell-off continues, rents on remaining properties will soar.
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Rohit Kohli
Director at The Mortgage Stop
The less than 24-hours notice is causing chaos across many transactions as landlords are actively considering their options. We're already getting calls from landlords that had been looking to buy asking to know how much extra they need to pay in stamp duty. This isn't just going to hit landlords but many homebuyers who have a buy-to-let or let-to-buy transaction in their chain are also at risk.
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Elliott Culley
Director at Switch Mortgage Finance
Prospective buyers need to find 2% more money for stamp duty, which none would have been budgeting for. Making a change to be implemented the next day, shows little thought was put into how this could affect the lives of working people, as it doesnt give any timeframe to clients already committed to purchases to account for this change. This was a policy aimed at landlords but there will be collateral damage to first time buyers, and home movers caught up in chains collapsing.
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Kundan Bhaduri
Property Developer and Portfolio Landlord at The Kushman Group
Labour’s hasty, high-tax approach has taken an already fragile housing sector and piled on more pressure, especially for smaller landlords who lack the deep pockets to absorb additional costs. The immediate backlash shows how disconnected these policy-makers are from the realities of the housing market. For many landlords, adding properties has now become a financially unviable choice, leading to a more constrained rental market for tenants. It’s hard not to wonder: does the government expect housing shortages to resolve themselves, or are they content to stifle one of the few remaining investment avenues left for small players?
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Hannah Bashford
Director at Model Financial Solutions
Having to find an extra 2% on a house purchase overnight is no mean feat. The fallout of this being an overnight decision could mean chains fall apart. Clients with let-to-buy applications may find that it is no longer viable to keep those properties and therefore the chain is incomplete and they then need to find a buyer, which will delay purchases.
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Amit Patel
Adviser at Trinity Finance
A good day to bury bad news! Giving landlords and property investors no notice whatsoever is shear lunacy. I can see many deals now collapsing as a result of this. Rents will increase as housing stock diminishes. They've clearly not thought this one through properly.
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Tasnime Rotherham
Founder at Very Craftea
I'm not a landlord, I'm just a person who needs to move home but hasn't been able to sell my current home, so have taken an eye-watering bridging loan until my current home sells. This increase is pushing me to potentially step away from the deal (we are due to complete on Monday!) because I have no idea where I am going to find this other money from
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Kim McGinley
Director & Specialist Broker at VIBE Finance
Honestly, the way these stamp duty changes have been pushed through overnight is just baffling. We knew landlords were firmly in the government’s sights, especially under Labour, but this slapdash approach? It’s so reckless. With such little time to prepare, we’re already seeing transactions on the brink of collapsing as buyers and sellers scramble to make sense of the new rules.

The knock-on effects are going to be substantial, not just for landlords, but for everyone in the property market. This kind of knee jerk policy shift is a massive confidence killer at a time when the market is already navigating choppy waters. Instead of piling on last minute changes, we need stability and proper support to keep the property market balanced. It’s people’s homes, livelihoods, and investments on the line here, and they deserve far better than this.
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Iain Swatton
Director at Exemplar Financial Services
The feared increase in CGT may not have materialized for residential or buy-to-let properties, but the rise in SDLT still places pressure on the buy-to-let market. This shift will lead to some investors reevaluating their purchase plans. While those focused on long-term rental returns may continue undeterred, others may find the additional SDLT costs enough to rethink or redirect their investment strategies. It’s a pivotal moment, as investors weigh the current tax landscape against potential future gains.