‘Letting agents must back petition to reinstate landlord tax breaks’
Maxine Fothergill says industry must support the petition, whose creator says S24 landlord tax breaks loss is damaging rental sector.
Leading industry figure Maxine Fothergill (pictured) is asking fellow letting agents to sign a parliamentary petition calling for the Section 24 changes to buy-to-let landlord taxation to be scrapped.
Launched by Midlands landlord Simon Foster, the petition calls for the Government to allow landlords to offset their mortgage interest costs against their tax, something they were able to do until former Chancellor George Osborne scrapped the scheme in 2015.
Fothergill says: “Landlord and agents, are all painfully aware of the effect Section 24 has had on the buy-to-let market which in many cases, has reduced stock as many landlords have been selling up as it has become less viable to stay in the sector.
“With a serious housing shortage, we can’t afford to lose any more rental housing stock and we need the Government to sit up and listen to our sector to stop this daily erosion.
“If you haven’t yet signed, please sign up now and please pass this into other letting agents and investment property landlords so we can get the required number to get this debate tabled.”
Struggling
Foster’s petition has been signed by 9,700 people so far but needs to reach 100,000 to trigger a debate by MPs within the House of Parliament.
The landlord says: “Like many self-employed business people I am a small, well-established private landlord that is now struggling to make any money from letting properties.
“Unless the ability to offset mortgage interest against rental income is reinstated I will like many be forced to sell my properties. This could reduce the number of properties available on the private rental market.”
Imperative that we get this legislation reversed to encourage Landlords to remain in the PRS. Especially with the reforms due to come through in the next few years! Otherwise the sector will shrink to nothing and there will not be anything left of the Private rental sector.