This week’s first comments come in response to the article: Brokers rage over ‘idiotic’, ‘irresponsible’ and ‘economically illiterate’ inheritance tax plans ‒ analysis
Arron said: “The suggestion is only four per cent pay inheritance tax, so one might think only a few are affected, but maybe two to three times as many employ schemes to avoid it. The four per cent are those who fail to get advice, as theoretically everyone can avoid inheritance tax.
“The limits were previously reformed to do away with gifts and trusts to help those in the intermediate stage avoid paying tax. Notwithstanding, the call for removing inheritance is because it is fundamentally an unfair tax, as one pays tax on their assets when accumulating them and a further 40 per cent on death.
“And removal may well encourage the world’s wealthy to move to the UK for which it should be noted the top 10 per cent of earners (those on £50k+) pay 90 per cent of all income tax. The worse off will be IFAs, who will lose a source of income.”
John Yerou added: “I can’t believe some of the comments in this article from brokers. First of all, most of the super wealthy avoid inheritance because they can afford advice from tax specialists utilising trust and other clever investment vehicles/schemes.
“In actual fact, the people that are affected the most by inheritance tax are the middle classes, not the rich/wealthy. But then again, it depends on your definition of wealthy.”
He continued: “There are many countries around the world that have scrapped inheritance tax who have thriving economies with the largest middle class population. Take Singapore and Cyprus, for example. If inheritance tax is removed, our children and grandchildren can afford to buy a property rather than renting. Why shouldn’t our children and grandchildren benefit from our hard earned estate?”
Government needs to make housing ‘senior post’
This week’s last comment is in response to: Lower base rate expectations will restore the property market – Bloomberg Intelligence
Michelle Lawson said: “Couldn’t agree more with this, however until the government make housing a senior post and a proper effort to reform as part of their policy and agenda, we are stuck in the quicksand.”
The comments here are from our readers and do not necessarily reflect the views of Mortgage Solutions and Specialist Lending Solutions.
