New Property Tax Rumoured

[Donagh]

Good man Donagh. Nothing like an ideological debate at midnight on a Friday!!!!

Feck, did I write that? The sooner the 'drink and surf' ban comes in the better 

[Bogball XV]

I'm begining to think this property tax should be called "envy tax", i am really getting browned off with people slagging off people who did well during the boom years, of course there were loads of chancers who broke the rules and made quick cash. There were alos a lot of ordinary people who did not go on holidays 3 or 4 times a year, buy a new car every year or have the latest designer handbag every month. These people took advantage of the cheap money that was available built up a portfolio of properties, made sacrifices and are now been penalised for their endevours. i for example have 2 properties along with my primary residence... both my self and my wife are on medium incomes, we drive a 99 and a 01 car and have not been on a holiday in 3 years. we have scrimped and saved every penny to be in the situtaiton we are in now. I have friends who during the boom claimed they couldn't afford to buy a house, but they could afford an A3 and A4, prada handbags, 2 or 3 holidays a year but couldnt save up to put a deposit on a house.  it was often joked that myself and the missus been the only two people in the area with cars dating from the last century. I am in the construction industry, i have a trade but changed career about 5 years ago and went back to college and am finishing my degree this summer. I never got any help from anyone to get to the position  i am in now. I dont have a pension as what i am building up, will all going well be my pension. There have been a lot of sleepless nights during the past 4 years all about money, but thankfully it has worked out. Had i put my money into gold or art or wine, there would be no levy, so why is it that property is all of a sudden such a dirty business.Also it really grates me that people are taking such pleasure from seeing people who were doing well now going under especially in the construction industry, i 'm not talking about the large scale developers who owe hundereds of millions, but ordinary people, a lot with not much fromal education finally getting a chance in this country to be entrupenuers and own their own businesses, i remember in the late eighties every one form my area emigrating and the only time we had a football team was st. stephens day when the emigrants were home. I realise that there has to be taxation changes, but let it be fair about it. I have no problem paying tax and in my opinion if there is a property tax on rental properties it will only be added on to the rent, thus increasing costs for renters. But taxing people just becuause they have a large house, regardless of their income or means is madness. There are a lot of millionaires living in small houses with no mortgages and a lot of people with huge morgages and not much income living in huge houses. I know that most of you will completly disagree with me on the above points, but everybodys situation is different and a blanket taxation policy will not be fair or equitable. Thank god i'm not in government.

I have sympathy for you and appreciate the problems you would have with a property tax, but, you've got to accept much of the reason that your investments were feasable in the first place was because of the tax treatment afforded to second homes.  You were in construction and doubtless getting good money, for those less fortunate, they could not afford any of the multitude of new homes springing up around them, a large part of the reason behind that was the buy to let market pushing up prices.
Finally, in the current market the chances of landlords pushing up prices because their own costs have increased are slim in the extreme.

[blast05]

These people took advantage of the cheap money that was available built up a portfolio of properties, made sacrifices and are now been penalised for their endevours. i for example have 2 properties along with my primary residence... both my self and my wife are on medium incomes,

Exact same boat myself. Have 2 other properties above my principal primary residence (such is the name the banks call it). We scrimped and saved to buy these to try and secure a long term financial future (not overly concerned about current crash as bought in for the long hall). We bought one and built the other. In doing so we contributed massively, both directly and indirectly to the exchequer, provided employment in the contruction industry and pay yearly taxes on rental income ....... my proposed punishment for trying to have a degree of financial responsibility - a €1000 fine per year for each property.
Had i taken my money and invested outside the country and thus deproved the exchequer of this money, then not a cent of this 1 grand per property would i have to pay.

By all means bring in water rates (this in turn would greatly reduce the annual amount that would need to be invested in the water provisioning infrastructure as people would use far less) and increase top tax to 46 or 48%, lower rate to 22 or 24 and nobody in employment is exempt from paying PAYE tax. Means test childrens allowance (over 60% of parents save the childrens allowance) and drop public pay in line with deflation (5% prediction by end of year). Most of these changes would pain me but at least they are fair and equitable. All combined would easily bring in the required 4 billion for 2010. ......... For the budget in Dec 2010, let hope there is an economic turnaround meaning there is not another 4 billion needed there.

[blast05]

you've got to accept much of the reason that your investments were feasable in the first place was because of the tax treatment afforded to second homes

And what treatment would that be ? Any rent i get above and beyond the interest on the mortgage is subject to top rate of tax. Count in stamp duty for the purchase too and i certainly wouldn't call the tax treatment in any way beneficial as you imply.

[blast05]

I think this proposal on boards.ie has merit:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055472502

although perhaps its a case of 'i would, wouldn't i'
Read a post from the same poster on apge 2 as a follow-up to the first post.

[Bord na Mona man]

In doing so we contributed massively, both directly and indirectly to the exchequer, provided employment in the contruction industry and pay yearly taxes on rental income ....... my proposed punishment for trying to have a degree of financial responsibility - a €1000 fine per year for each property.

Not being smart but you could also say that you contributed towards elbowing first time buyers out of the market, thereby forcing up prices to unrealistic levels and also encouraging short term growth in a sector that was never going to be sustainable.

I don't believe in taxing people's primary homes, however I think it is fair to do it on buy to let properties.
For too long the investors had the advantages on the property market, like the ability to write off costs against tax.
The horse has bolted now of course and we are left rightly up the creek for our sins when it comes to property.
A couple of hundred thousand empty houses is some legacy to the madness that went on.

[Dougal Maguire]

A property tax would only make sense if the revenue collected was used to pay for services such as waste disposal etc. The current system whereby residents  pay for bin collection services at source only seems to act as an encouragement to some to dump their rubbish illegally rather than pay to have it collected. THe introduction of a property tax to pay for these services would remove that problem

[brokencrossbar1]

When we moved down in 2006 it was something that struck me as being mad.  We had been paying rates in our house in Belfast which was around the same size as the house we currently are in.  In our current house we pay 380 eur average to have our bins collected.  In Belfast we paid £1800 stg for basically the same privilege!  A property tax based on the size of the house, the sq footage of the site and the services available to it would be the way to go in my view.  As has been pointed out some people scrimped and saved to get 2-3 properties as a pension plan and fair play to the but this has been pointed out has helped drive prices up to an unsustainable which contributed greatly to our current situation.  If the demand wasn't there the supply would have dried up and that is basic economics.

A property tax would only make sense if the revenue collected was used to pay for services such as waste disposal etc. The current system whereby residents  pay for bin collection services at source only seems to act as an encouragement to some to dump their rubbish illegally rather than pay to have it collected. THe introduction of a property tax to pay for these services would remove that problem

I agree 100%.

[pintsofguinness]

BC

When we moved down in 2006 it was something that struck me as being mad.  We had been paying rates in our house in Belfast which was around the same size as the house we currently are in.  In our current house we pay 380 eur average to have our bins collected.  In Belfast we paid £1800 stg for basically the same privilege!

Should have read this thread before the other one, but that's the same point I was making. 
Yous have had it lucky.
I'm pretty sure my last rates bill was....£1100? (something like that anyway - certanly more than a grand) and Council tax in England is worse, you'd be looking at atleast 100 quid a month for a one bedroom flat.  (unlike the north, tenants are left to pay it.) And here in England we dont even a f**king bin! We live in a block of flats and everyone has to dump bags of rubbish out the front of the place and wait on someone to lift it!!!

[the Deel Rover]

Didn't realise you lived in England Pog

[Uladh]

"Property is theft" a good man once said and as you have no more a legitimate claim over the land your house is built on than I have, then it's only right and proper you are taxed on it. I'd go futher and suggest that once a property tax is defaulted on, ownership of the land and buildings should revert back to the state.

why should the state have more a legitimate claim on the land that you or i?

[pintsofguinness]

Didn't realise you lived in England Pog

Jeeze, you never heard any of my complaints about lack of decent sausages?

[blast05]

Not being smart but you could also say that you contributed towards elbowing first time buyers out of the market, thereby forcing up prices to unrealistic levels and also encouraging short term growth in a sector that was never going to be sustainable.

Maybe so, but the parameters put in place by the government and by extension the banks effectively encouraged this. Now they want to completely change the goalposts and combined with the drops in prices and difficulties in achieving a rental income to cover mortgages - there will be tens of thousands of small time investors who will become bankrupt as a consequence of this complete u-turn in policy by government  - not right. Of course those who benefited from the boom - the people who hoarded land until they got the max price and the builders who were smart enough to stop building at the right time - won't be unduly impacted by a property tax

If a property tax does come, then it should at least mean no more bin charges and no introduction of water rates. Of course i fully expect that in a few years we will have all 3 - water rates, bin charges and a whopper of a property tax ....  riots on the street.

And for what its worth, i don't consider myself to have elbowed first time buyers out of the market as despite what i said, its more a case of both myself and my wife owned our own houses before we even met and then at a later stage scripmed and saved for 5 years to build our own house as a base down west - and still we will be punished for my wife not selling her house after we got married.

And finally, the logic people are propsing for taxing second homes only seems to be that if you have more than one home, then it is a business you are in - even if your second property is a holiday home for personal use. Well folllowing this logic then shouldn't all agricultural land in the country also be taxed instead of hundreds of millions of new grants and levies being given to farmers every year - the latest one seeing a 400 million overspend on a scheme to allow farmers build sheds for sheep, cattle, etc ....... the reality of course is that in a lot of cases, these sheds have cost the farmers nothing cos of grants and cash payments to builders who then still provided receipts  ...... and better still the sheds in a lot of cases are being used for little more than a place to park the tractor and store round bales indoors.

[muppet]

In doing so we contributed massively, both directly and indirectly to the exchequer, provided employment in the contruction industry and pay yearly taxes on rental income ....... my proposed punishment for trying to have a degree of financial responsibility - a €1000 fine per year for each property.

Not being smart but you could also say that you contributed towards elbowing first time buyers out of the market, thereby forcing up prices to unrealistic levels and also encouraging short term growth in a sector that was never going to be sustainable.

I don't believe in taxing people's primary homes, however I think it is fair to do it on buy to let properties.
For too long the investors had the advantages on the property market, like the ability to write off costs against tax.
The horse has bolted now of course and we are left rightly up the creek for our sins when it comes to property.
A couple of hundred thousand empty houses is some legacy to the madness that went on.

They are proposing taxing every home in the State. No doubt the exceptions will be those unsold by developers which is what has strangeld the market.

Buy to let already yields tax for the exchequer. They could look at reducing tax relief on buy to let but double taxing them (treble if you include stamp duty with property tax and income tax on rent) is hardly fair and will add another nail to the property coffin.

[An Gaeilgoir]

I already pay 380 euors a year for bins for my primary residence down the west. I have a septic tank for this property and paid the county council 3000 euro of a charge of some kind of development tax. The areas i bought the properties are reasonably good areas with good public transport. Like Blast i am looking at these properties as been part of a 10-15 year plan. I still work in the construction sector but as i said in an earlier post, i changed career and was for the most part of the bom, earning half of what i would have had i continued with my trade. This again was part of the 10-15 year plan, there arent too many 50 year old sparks walking around sites any more.