There has been a lot in the news recently of the new stamp duty charge of 3% on second homes that are purchased but you may be wondering what date does the new stamp duty charge come into effect?
The new stamp duty charge means that you will pay an extra 3% on the whole purchase price of the property providing it costs over £40,000 (see our stamp duty calculation to work out exactly how much you will have to pay) and if you own more than one property at the end of the day of the transaction and the date that this becomes effective is 1st April 2016.
Some people have been thinking that the change will be coming at the start of the tax year on 6th April but this is not the case, it starts on 1st April.
With the weekend before the change being the Easter holiday this may mean that a lot of solicitors have to give up their Easter break to ensure that transactions go through before the cut off date or else there is likely to be some late working for solicitors and possibly mortgage companies too, on Thursday 31st March to get the transactions through in time to beat the change.
There is only one exception to the date rule and that is where contracts were exchanged before the announcement date of 26th November 2015 but where completion takes place after 31st March 2016. This will likely only affect a very small number of transactions.
If you are still thinking that you want to get a purchase completed before the cut off then you will need to have a very speedy transaction if you have not started yet. Some auction houses have brought forward auction dates so that completion can be before the cut off date, as auction houses often have a 28 day completion clause so you may well be able to get a property purchase completed using an auction house purchase.