You are currently browsing the Paris Smith LLP Legal Blog archives for May, 2010.
The New Coalition Government has agreed that the Conservative’s proposed increase in the inheritance tax threshold to £1million will not go ahead and instead the inheritance tax threshold will remain at £325,000 for each individual. Any estate worth over this threshold will be subject to inheritance tax at 40%.
There are ways of reducing the inheritance tax liability on your estate and individuals should take tax planning advice if they wish to minimise inheritance tax.
After days of speculation, the legal requirement for sellers to provide Home Information Packs (HIPs) has been formally suspended.
Paris Smith sees this as a positive development and most people in the property sector seem to agree that HIPs were an unnecessary expense for people trying to sell their house, adding up to £350 to their bill and slowing down the market.
Sellers however will still need to provide an Energy Performance Certificate, the official energy efficiency assessment of their property.
Grant Shapps, Housing Minister, commented “…the new Government is ensuring that home information packs are history. This is a great example of how we are determined to get straight down to work and cut pointless red tape which is strangling the market”.
For further information contact john.mansell@parissmith.co.uk