Stamp duty refund.

Hope this is the best forum for this.

Bought an apartment for 200K 3 years ago.
Got a call 2 weeks ago from the solicitor who handled the purchase to say I was due a small refund back from that transaction.
Received cheque for €2541.50 the other day stating I overpaid €2422.50 in respect of stamp duty due to the RC and €119 in respect of Land Reg fees. Note: thats not a small refund in my books!

Is this normal? How did they get is so wrong up-front? Who would have had my money for the past 3 years and surely I would be entitled to the paltry bit of interest.

Any thoughts?

How much stamp duty did you pay originally?

I presume it was an investment property? Or that you were not a first time buyer?

Paid about 8K originally + 2300 roughly in solicitors fees. Investment property.

Is this normal? How did they get is so wrong up-front? Who would have had my money for the past 3 years and surely I would be entitled to the paltry bit of interest.

Any thoughts?

I suspect that this was a ftb situation and that this happened around the time the rates changed. It is entirely possible that the deed was stamped and lodged in the Land Registry - the Land Registry can get the up front fees wrong. The dealing can easily take up to three years to complete at which time the over stamping/ fees issue may have shown and the solicitor sought the refund.

If it was me, I'd be planning how to spend it ( wisely of course) and thanking God for the lovely windfall. I'd also be thinking perhaps I should myself have checked out the stamp duty amount before completing so that I could be sure of my sums.

Of course, it could also be that the lying thieving gosh darn no good solicitor has just had a Law Society audit and they found the lovely dosh floating around in the client account. And made him pay it back.

Take your pick.

mf

Or could it be that VAT was not treated correctly at the time of the calculation?

The €8,000 makes sense on a purchase price of €200,000 ( a rate of 4%, which was correct as far as I can tell), but the purchase price would have contained an element of VAT.

Or could it be that VAT was not treated correctly at the time of the calculation?

Ah - well done Mr. Holmes. Much more likely.

mf

I did check the stamp - 4% was 8K so tbh I'm not sure why I'm getting the money back. I'm reluctant to probe the solicitor too much for fear that they realise they have made another error and they'll want the money back.

I was just hoping someone on here might know what was going on. Is there something about stamp only being payable on building costs less vat os something like that. Maybe thats what it is.

OK - two posts that say the same thing as I'm getting at while I typed the last post! I'm guessing thats it. OK so in that case I'm very aggrieved and I shall demand interest on my 2500 because the solicitor or builder couldnt do their sums right.

Some info in this thread may be useful.

Are you assuming no interest is included?

I would certainly be asking for an explanation of how the refund was calculated.

Just did some beermat calculations. Even if there was no consideration for land costs the vat element would only be about 22K. So the stamp difference would only be about 800. Have I got that right. I think at this point I should just take the money and run (or plough it into a Bulgarian property fund].

If the stamp was charged on VAT inclusive price in error, the rate might have consequently gone up.

liteweight said:

If the stamp was charged on VAT inclusive price in error, the rate might have consequently gone up.

Click to expand...

Genius - that's exactly it. I would have dropped to 3% after land costs were deducted and then once vat is removed from building cost that would account for the 2.5k I got back.

Thanks for that liteweight.

You can spend your money with a clear conscience now!