Day: March 16, 2016

    The growth of buy-to-let has been among the defining characteristics of the post-crisis mortgage market. Council of Mortgage Lenders figures released this month show that lending to landlords accounted for 17 per cent of all new loans in the third quarter of 2015. With rising property prices, meanwhile, property consultants Savills estimated last year that landlords had benefited from £177bn in capital growth since the start of the decade. In one sense, the changes being introduced by the government, which is increasing stamp duty on buy-to-let property while reducing the available tax relief, are substantial. The stamp duty hike alone – 3 per cent on top of current levels – is expected to raise £3bn over the next five years. So what impact, if any, will this have on the g...

    The organisation explained that between 2000 and 2015, the total net wealth of people in the UK had increased from £6tn (€7.73tn, $8.63tn) to £10tn, based on numbers from Credit Suisse. However, while just 7% of this new wealth created went to the UK's poorest 50% of 30 million people, the collective wealth of the richest 1% or 600,000 people increased by 79% to £2.4tn, during this period. The timing of this report is significant as it comes ahead of the 2016 budget that is scheduled for 16 March. Mark Goldring, chief executive at Oxfam said: "It's simply not right that a tiny group of individuals hoovers up so much of the UK's growing prosperity while barely any trickles down to those who have least. We need action to ensure that a rise in wealth is more evenly shared ...