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Property tax reforms

Journalist: Ima Jackson-Obot, FTAdviser

ended 07. August 2026

Hi all,

I'm working on a feature for FT Adviser examining whether the current property tax system is still fit for purpose, and what any future reforms to stamp duty and council tax could mean for advisers and clients.

I'm interested in finding out:

  • How often does stamp duty influence your clients' decisions about whether or when to move home?
  • Do you think the current system of stamp duty and council tax is fit for purpose? Why or why not?
  • Compared with house prices, affordability and deposit requirements, how significant is stamp duty as a barrier to home ownership and housing mobility?
  • If the government were to reform property taxes, what changes would make the biggest difference for your clients?
  • Which groups of clients would benefit most - or be most disadvantaged - by changes to the current system?
  • If the UK moved away from taxing property transactions and towards taxing property ownership, how would that change the advice you give clients?
  • If you had five minutes with the Chancellor, what's the one thing you'd change about the way housing is taxed?

Thanks

Ima

14 responses from the Newspage community

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Guy Skinner
Financial Planner and Director at Citygate Financial Planning
At the entry level point of the market SDLT greatly influences the decision to buy and when. In some cases with the return of higher loan to value mortgages, the stamp duty can represent a large chunk of the purchase costs in London and the South East.

There are 26 MILLION empty bedrooms in the UK, there is very little incentive to move for "empty nesters" and very few viable alternatives to an over priced retirement flat. Building more and eating into the green belt will only hurt us all more in future compared to the tax incentives that could be given around reduced care or IHT savings. Further, care giving could be distributed with greater ease and lower cost if there were much better retirement villages.

I think looking at stamp duty in isolation also ignores the VAT liability for improving an existing home. A great deal of the existing housing stock could be improved too, opening up more entry points for first time buyers
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Graham Nicoll
Financial Planner, Chartered FCSI at NCL Wealth Partners
Stamp duty is a major brake on housing mobility. Clients increasingly ask not just whether they can afford a property, but whether moving is worth the tax cost.
While deposits and affordability remain the biggest challenges for first-time buyers, stamp duty adds a growing burden as house prices rise. I
t also discourages downsizers from moving, limiting the supply of larger homes for families. Any reform should recognise the wider housing chain. Shifting more tax towards ownership rather than transactions could improve mobility, but risks affecting asset-rich, income-poor households.
My message to the Chancellor if we grabbed a coffee together would be that the priority should be reducing barriers to moving, modernising council tax fairly and avoiding unintended consequences for renters and housing supply.
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Stephen Perkins
Managing Director at Yellow Brick Mortgages
Stamp duty doesn’t just raise revenue, it changes behaviour. We regularly see homeowners delaying moves they would otherwise make, downsizers staying put and growing families postponing their next purchase because of the tax bill attached to moving home.

If I had five minutes with the Chancellor, I’d ask one question: is taxing people for moving home really the best way to raise revenue? The challenge isn’t whether government should collect tax, it’s finding a way of doing so without discouraging the housing mobility the economy depends on.
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Evren Ergin
Founder And Developer at ValuQ
Ask what I would put to the Chancellor and it is not another grand reform. It is two smaller things, and both are about stability.

First, freeze the rates. Leave them alone. Half the damage stamp duty does is not the tax itself, it is the constant tinkering with it. Every change triggers a rush to beat the deadline, then a slump the moment it passes, and the thresholds warp prices: since April, 9,616 homes sold in the £5,000 below the £300,000 line, against 4,652 above (ValuQ analysis). Certainty would end most of that overnight.

Second, split the bill between buyer and seller. Today the buyer carries all of it, in cash, on top of the deposit, at the moment they are most stretched. Share it and you do two things. You halve each side's exposure, so the market lurches less when a rate moves. And you lower the cash wall that keeps first-time buyers out.

The market does not need stamp duty reinvented. It needs it to sit still, and to be shared.
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Peter Dockar
Chief Commercial Officer at Gen H (Generation Home)
Stamp duty has a significant chilling effect on the market, both for first-time buyers and movers.

First-time buyers are increasingly skipping their "starter home" altogether and waiting longer to try to afford a bigger home, because the prospect of paying stamp duty on their first and second home, in reasonably short order, would be very difficult to afford.

Stamp duty penalises older borrowers, like empty nesters, where income may have decreased in recent years. When they sell the family home, they'll be on the hook for thousands in tax, and this discourages people from moving – reducing available housing stock.

Stamp duty contributes to sluggishness in the market from both sides – squeezing first-time buyers and pensioners alike. It punishes mobility, not wealth. It is not fit for purpose. A tax on ownership could be productive but guardrails would need to be put in place to rationalise tax according to income, not just property value, to avoid penalising retired homeowners.
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Nouran Moustafa
Practice Principal & IFA at Roxton Wealth
Stamp duty is not usually the biggest barrier for first-time buyers; deposits, affordability and monthly repayments matter more. But for home movers it can be the final reason not to move, particularly when upsizing, downsizing or relocating already involves legal, estate-agent and removal costs.

The current system is badly designed. Stamp duty taxes movement, while council tax in England still relies on 1991 property values. One discourages people from moving to the right home; the other bears little relationship to modern wealth.

I would reduce transaction taxes and replace them gradually with a fairer, regularly revalued property tax. That could improve mobility, but safeguards would be essential for asset-rich, income-poor homeowners who could not absorb a larger annual bill.

If I had five minutes with the Chancellor, I would say: stop taxing people so heavily for moving house. A functioning housing market needs people to move, not financial penalties for doing so.
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Mark Alexander
Founder at Property118.com
The biggest flaw in the current system is that it taxes transactions rather than encouraging housing mobility. Stamp Duty discourages people from moving, downsizing and upsizing, leaving housing stock underutilised. If I had five minutes with the Chancellor, I’d argue for shifting the tax burden away from transactions and towards ownership, while ensuring reforms don’t further penalise the private rented sector, which remains essential to meeting housing demand.
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Manooch Suree
Director at Zinga Financial Services
From my experience as a mortgage adviser, stamp duty often influences when people choose to move, particularly families looking to upsize and older homeowners considering downsizing. While it’s rarely the deciding factor, the upfront cost can delay a move or reduce a buyer’s budget. Affordability, mortgage rates and saving a deposit remain the biggest barriers to home ownership, especially for first-time buyers, but stamp duty has a greater impact on housing mobility. The current system, alongside outdated council tax, could benefit from reform. Reducing the upfront tax burden on moving home would encourage mobility, make better use of existing housing stock and support a healthier, more efficient housing market.
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Matt Coulson
Founder at Heron Financial Ltd
Stamp duty's biggest flaw is that it taxes the one thing we should want people to do, which is move to the right home. It's a wall of upfront cost that stops downsizers freeing up family homes and people relocating for work, and clients feel it most when they can least spare it. So no, I don't think it's fit for purpose, and council tax on 1991 values isn't either. But I'd be honest with clients about the alternative. Shifting to an annual ownership tax fixes the mobility problem and creates a new one: it turns a predictable one-off into an open-ended bill you have to plan for every year, deep into retirement. For an asset-rich, cash-poor client in a home that's gone up in value, that's a real headache, and it changes the advice from "budget for the move" to "budget for the rest of your life in this house". If I could change one thing, I'd scrap the tax on moving, but only with a replacement designed to protect people who can't pay a yearly charge from bricks they can't easily sell.
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Harvey Dhillon
Founder & CEO at Zmartly
Stamp duty is the bit of a house move your mortgage will not usually cover. That is why it changes plans. It comes up in almost every move, and shifts the timing far more often than the decision. No, neither is fit for purpose. English council tax bands still rest on what a home was worth on 1 April 1991. Stamp duty taxes moving, not owning, so it bills the same family again and again and pays people to stay put. Against house prices, deposits and lending limits it is a small barrier to a first home, and a big barrier to moving: it is due within 14 days of completion. The biggest fix is the cliff edges: in England and Northern Ireland a first-time buyer £1 over £500,000 loses the relief entirely and pays £5,000 more. Movers and downsizers gain; owners whose homes far outgrew their 1991 band lose. An ownership tax would move the advice from when to buy to what you can afford to keep, and in whose name. Five minutes with the Chancellor: revalue every home in England, not just the top.
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Harry Goodliffe
Director at HTG Mortgages
Ask anyone stuck in a house that no longer fits them and stamp duty will come up within the first few minutes. Buyers overstretch because they can't face paying it twice, and older owners sit tight because a five-figure bill to downsize feels like madness. Deposits and affordability are still the bigger barrier to buying your first home, but stamp duty is easily the biggest barrier to moving again afterwards. If I had five minutes with the Chancellor, I'd keep it simple: stop charging people for moving home.
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Antonia Medlicott
Founder & MD at Investing Insiders
The current system is poorly aligned with today's housing market. Stamp duty creates a high upfront cost when buyers have already stretched themselves to cover costs elsewhere, and causes delays or prevents transactions. This is particularly the case for second steppers and older homeowners considering downsizing, which reduces housing mobility and creates knock-on effects throughout the market.

Council tax has little-to-no relationship between what someone pays and the current value of their home; it’s like rolling a dice, pure luck. If changes are made to the property tax system, the Chancellor needs to strike the balance with a simpler, more stable housing tax framework. Tax policy should support people moving to homes that better suit their circumstances rather than acting as a financial penalty for doing so. Healey needs to be careful though, as removing stamp duty might increase house prices further and only put more power in the hands of landlords or property investors.
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Robin Edwards
Partner at Curetons Property Finders
Stamp duty is a consideration for most of my clients, particularly those buying higher-value homes in London where the tax bill can run into huge sums. However it is rarely the main reason someone decides not to move.

The current system is not fit for purpose because it taxes mobility. Stamp duty discourages people from moving to homes that better suit their needs, whether that is downsizing, relocating for work or upsizing for a growing family.

Lower transaction taxes would particularly help younger buyers and families trying to move up the ladder, while a property ownership tax could disadvantage asset-rich, but cash-poor homeowners, such as retirees.

If I had 5 minutes with the Chancellor I would argue for scrapping stamp duty entirely and replacing it with a fairer, more predictable system that encourages people to move rather than stay put purely to avoid tax.
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Matthew Fleming-Duffy
Founder at Harbour Home Finance Ltd
For me, the biggest issue is housing mobility. I frequently see people delay or abandon plans to move because Stamp Duty makes it financially unattractive. The result is that people remain in homes that no longer suit their needs, while larger family homes aren't released back into the market and smaller homes aren't freed up for first-time buyers. If I had five minutes with the Chancellor, I'd say our housing tax system should encourage people to live in the right home, not discourage them from moving. Any reform must be fiscally responsible, but reducing the barriers to 'rightsizing' would improve housing mobility and benefit the wider economy. Looking ahead, there may also be merit in rewarding energy-efficient homes through the tax system, helping to support both housing mobility and sensible environmental goals.