Reform of Stamp Duty Is Required

The British Property Federation believes that the residential rental property sector will become more attractive to investors if the government reforms the stamp duty. According to BPF, currently the problem is that at the moment investors are discouraged from pumping funds into the BTL sector because the duty is much higher when property is being bought en masse, rather than individually.
While small individual landlords pay an average of 1% when they purchase one residential property, large portfolio investors usually end up paying as much as 4-5% when they buy blocks of properties.
The British Property Federation believes that large portfolio investors should be charged individually and the stamp duty rate should be determined separately for each property purchased. Such strategy is supposed to level up the playing field for large portfolio investors and small-scale landlords. Leading companies of the residential property sector believe that the government can play a major role in the economic recovery of the UK if it agrees to reform the stamp duty.
Other economists believe that stamp duty reform can be the only way to avoid a major decline in buy to let investment, especially given current lack of accessible buy to let loans.