Stamp duty - property abroad

D

darraghdog

Guest
Hello,
I moved back from abroad after a few years and used some money from the sale of a property in another country to put a mortgage on a house here. I bought as a first time buyer here last december, and did not have to pay stamp duty. Is this ok, even though I had previously bought abroad ? What are the implication with the tax system here - could there be comeback ?
Thanks,
Darraghdog
 
I believe to qualify as a first time buyer it should be the purchase of your first property either here or abroad, so it seems if you depended on this exemption to be relieved of stamp duty, then you were wrong to do so. As to whether there will be a come back...who knows? Assuming you wish to rectify the situation, I suppose you could contact the revenue and indicate you've made a mistake and offer to now pay the stamp duty. At best they will accept the correct stamp duty, at worst they will impose interest and penalties. For what its worth, I personally find them very helpful if approached in a 'hands up, sorry I got it wrong, but it wasnt deliberate, now can we sort it out ' situation. I do not believe they would be so helpful for someone deliberately evading tax.
 
Thanks for this information, and I agree with your approach. Just in case it comes to it, do you know what sort of penalties we could be talking about ?
 
The penalties payable are:
within 6 months-10%
between 6 to 12 months- 20%
more than 12 months- 30%

The interest rate is 1% per month.

There are potential surcharges also but I'm not sure if these would apply in your circumstances- they can be up to 100% of the duty.

As I said, the Revenue have a discretion to mitigate where an honest mistake is made. If you do apply to pay your stamp duty, and the individual you are dealing with decides not to mitigate, you could consider contacting your local TD and asking them to intercede for you.
 
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