THE BUDGET 11 MARCH 2020

TODAY’S BLOG

THE BUDGET 11 MARCH 2020

In order to save you time, I watched the Budget and even had a neat little animated logo designed for the occasion. Prior to the Budget I had hopes of some significant pension reforms – to simplify pensions whilst also hoping for the possibility of a fairer tax system, which means different things to different people – I would probably settle for a more straight-forward one.

In fairness to Rishi Sunak, becoming Chancellor when he did must have felt rather like a “hospital pass”. By which I mean a term used in rugby, where you are passed the ball so that you are the last one to face some enormous opponent who will surely flatten you and send you to hospital for treatment.

As he prepared for his Budget, we were all aware of the gathering momentum of “coronavirus” and the global collapse of the stock markets as investors seem unable to comprehend the impact on trade and the current oil price war between Russia and Saudi Arabia. No small matters and certainly sufficient to cause significant “alarm”.

INCOME TAX

Rates remained unchanged – so depending on whether you are a glass half empty or half full, if you allow for inflation, that’s worse, but better than an increase.

Personal Allowance: £12,500
Basic rate (20%) on the next £37,500
Higher rate (40%) on income up to £150,000 (but loss of personal allowance at £100,000 ars previously)
Additional rate (45%) on income over £150,000

The only allowance to improve marginally was Capital Gains tax (increased from £12,000 to £12,300), which will be of little comfort today.

PENSIONS

The Lifetime Allowance has increased by inflation to £1,073,100. The precision of this number speaks volumes of the Treasury’s desire to collect every penny.

Anyone earning over £300,000 can only contribute £4,000 to a pension (including employer payments). Otherwise, some relief for Hospital Consultants as the Tapered Annual Allowance was inflated by £90,000 to impact those with incomes over £240,000. This keeps tax calculations complex and required, but likely to kill off public sympathy for the cause to simply abolish the Tapered Annual Allowance. If you really don’t understand this, it probably doesn’t impact you.

ISAs

There remain at a very healthy £20,000 of tax-free growth and tax-free income when withdrawn, unlike a pension which has tax relief and provides taxable income. This also tells you something about the Treasury.

A Junior ISA (JISA) has been greatly increased to allow for a significant £9,000 into a JISA each tax year from 2020/21. No real benefit for adults, but of course a bit of a nod to those funding University. Though this could turn into a large fund over time and some thought ought to be given to how most 18 year-olds handle money.

INHERITANCE TAX

No changes

BUSINESS OWNERS

Those wishing to sell a business that they built will now have much higher taxes to pay on sale as entrepreneurs’ relief was slashed. The 10% tax rate on sale of a business still applies but only on the first £1m rather than the first £10m. That idea that your business is your pension… well, think again the new allowance is lower than the Lifetime Allowance.

CORONAVIRUS – CORVID19

Various special measures have been “initiated” to enable people to have some form of basic minimum income (statutory sick pay) from first signs of illness and self-isolation. This is an attempt to head off concerns that those needing to earn cannot afford to be ill and therefore continue to pose a “threat” to the rest of us. Whether it works remains to be seen – I suspect call centres will be jammed for some time.

As far as I can tell today, a few things are in short supply and probably more expensive than a week ago – toilet paper, hand sanitiser and wisdom.

Dominic Thomas
Solomons IFA

You can read more articles about Pensions, Wealth Management, Retirement, Investments, Financial Planning and Estate Planning on my blog which gets updated every week. If you would like to talk to me about your personal wealth planning and how we can make you stay wealthier for longer then please get in touch by calling 08000 736 273 or email [email protected]

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THE BUDGET 11 MARCH 2020Dominic2025-01-21T16:33:58+00:00

TAX YEAR END PLANNING PART 2

TODAY’S BLOG

TAX YEAR END PLANNING PART 2 – CAPITAL GAINS

2019 was a good year for nearly all investors in share or bond-based funds. Even the Brexit-buffeted UK stock market, something of laggard in global terms, grew by over 14%. If your portfolio does not show some decent capital gains for the year, it is probably in need of a serious review.

As a general rule, it makes sense to realise gains up to the Capital Gains Tax (CGT) annual exempt amount each tax year. The exemption, covering £12,000 of gains in 2019/20, cannot be carried forward: use it by 3 April (the tax year ends on Sunday 5 April), or you lose it. Systematically using the exemption can help avoid building up large gains over the years which attract tax. Currently, the maximum tax rate on gains is 20% for higher and additional rate taxpayers (28% for gains involving residential property and carried interest).

If you want to crystallise gains to use your exemption, but would prefer to retain the same investments, you cannot simply sell them one day and buy them back the next. Anti-avoidance rules prevent this from being effective, but there are alternatives that achieve a similar result, such as reinvesting in an ISA or self-invested personal pension.

CAPITAL GAINS TAX IN PRACTICE

CGT applies to nearly all forms of investment, the notable exceptions being ISAs, Pensions and Investment Bonds. In simple terms, you want to trigger gains by selling an asset that has increased in value. Ideally you want to trigger as close to the allowance (£12,000) as possible. Thats a gain. So by way of example, if you invested £10,000 in 2010 and the investment is now worth £22,000 you would need to sell the entire investment to trigger a gain of £12,000.

The important issue is to know when you invested and how much. This is often more complicated than it appears because funds or holdings may well generate income which might have been paid to you, but may well have been re-invested. Over time the sums get very complicated.

We do a lot of work for clients that have a portfolio that we gradually convert into ISAs. Each year we trigger gains to move over into your ISA, ideally until the taxable investment has nothing left as it has all been moved into a tax-free ISA pot. This is a good way to gradually convert a portfolio into a tax-free portfolio.

A married couple have their own allowance each, but this is only relevant if the investment is jointly owned. Trusts also have a CGT allowance, but only at half the rate of the personal allowance (£6,000 in 2019/20).

Dominic Thomas
Solomons IFA

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TAX YEAR END PLANNING PART 2Dominic2025-01-21T16:33:59+00:00

WARNING ABOUT LIFETIME ISAS

TODAY’S BLOG

WARNING ABOUT LIFETIME ISAs

Most of our clients have ISAs, because they are a fantastic way to grow investments in a tax free environment. Lifetime ISAs, or LISAs are not really aimed at the sort of people we work with. However pehaps you have a child, friend or colleague, typically under the age of 40 that might have a LISA – this may be worth sharing with them.

An ISA but with tax relief

Lifetime ISAS (sometimes called LISAs) are a way in which many people will opt to save money – be that to buy their first property or for later in life. This was a Government response to attempt to help young people build a deposit to get onto the property ladder (not a good one in my opinion). The total penalties savers have paid when withdrawing their money in a Lifetime ISA has been revealed by HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC). Savers who have a Lifetime ISA can get a 25% government bonus added to their savings in this type of account – up to a maximum bonus of £1,000 per year. The maximum amount which can be paid into the account is £4,000 each tax year – up until a person reaches the age of 50. But while the 25% bonus may attract some savers, there are some rules about withdrawing the savings. The money can be withdrawn from this type of ISA if a person is:

Buying their first home
Aged 60 or older
Terminally ill, with less than 12 months to live.

Break the agreement, expect a hefty charge

However, a 25% charge must be paid if the saver withdraws cash or assets for any other reason. The withdrawal charge aims to recover the government bonus received, and applies an extra charge to the original savings. this means that if a person treats their Lifetime ISA as a short-term savings product, it may be that they get less back than they paid in. Data obtained by the Royal London in a Freedom of Information (FOI) request shows that HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) have so far charged more than £9million in penalties for withdrawing money out of a Lifetime ISA. In short people that picked the WRONG type of ISA pay a price.

Dominic Thomas
Solomons IFA

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WARNING ABOUT LIFETIME ISASDominic2025-01-21T15:54:46+00:00

TAX FREE AT 65 – IT’S ABOUT TIME…

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TAX FREE AT 65, IT’S ABOUT TIME…

I am going to have to put a lot of caveats with this item on tax free money. There are lots of ways to have tax free money, but I want to highlight a couple of issues, the first being the different tax treatment of different financial products and secondly how these might be used in conjunction with the current tax rules.

Joan is 65 and now finally retired – it’s about time!

Joan (10/02/1954) was 65 at the start of the tax year but she stopped working in February when she turned 65. She is single and back in the late 80’s a dead-ringer for Kim Bassinger. She has worked since leaving University in 1977 and much like her favourite band Fleetwood Mac, she has gone her own way. She did a bit of employed work whilst at Uni, but got her “first proper job” working as a junior assistant in an advertising company. Over the years she worked for various employers, most didn’t have pension schemes, anyway most wouldn’t let you join them until you were 30, so by the time she actually joined a scheme at 35 (in 1989), she didn’t really feel that she was too late to the party. She didn’t really like pensions, or rather the sharp suited, red-tie wearing blokes from Merchant Investors that sold them, they reminded her of some of the worst people in advertising. Then there was Robert Maxwell, no she didn’t like pensions at all. Mind you she was quite pleased that her current adviser found an old Contracted Out of SERPS pension, worth about £85,000 – so one of those fellas must have persuaded her to sign a form at some point. It helped top up her pension fund quite a lot to about £400,000.

At the age of 30 Joan bought her Wimbledon house in 1984 for £34,000 which was a lot back then. She recalls a great house warming party – lots of Wham! and Duran Duran. Looking back she wondered how she afforded it, (the house, not the party) given that interest rates were about 10% and kept going up. However property prices seemed to be rising (hers had doubled in value in 5 years) and she was forming a habit for nice things, which nearly got out of hand, but she spoke to her bank and remortgaged, increasing her loan in 1988 to almost £60,000. When the property crash happened shortly afterwards life got a little tricky, she had to economise. She enjoyed applying tips to improve her home from Tessa Shaw and the team on Home Front. She loved relaxing in the evening having done a bit of decorating whilst listening to Simply Red’s “Stars” curled up on the sofa. It heped her manage her feelings about her large mortgage which barely seemed to reduce in the first 10 years, but at least it was – and she hung in there. She finally paid off her mortgage 10 years ago at the age of 55. She still believes it was her best investment.

Joan quite liked PEPs and ISAs. She remembered getting a little lucky with a few Building Societies that demutualised and even put the proceeds into a Single Company PEP. She wasn’t sure why she liked them, perhaps it was because she was told she could get her money out if she needed to (she never did) or perhaps it was because it seemed that they were more glamorous, or was that because she seemed to remember a tune by Right Said Fred called “I’m Too Sexy For My Shirt” that was playing a lot at the time. It wasn’t, that was 1991, no perhaps it was all those boy bands like Westlife and Boyzone that she secretly liked she remembers them being around in 1999, that was Tony Blair and all the optimism and promise of equality of new Labour. She kept up her regular savings and built up her ISAs, which began 20 years ago in 1999.

Joan had learned a bit about investing, the important things like ignoring what everyone else said, she first learned this as her Yuppie thirtysomething friends got into a panic in the crash of October ’87 which she ignored. Then shortly after opening her new ISA learned never to invest in a technology themed fund when the dot-com bubble burst. She chalked it up to “experience”. Other than that, she took investment news in her stride, largely ignoring the mountains of paper that seemed to pile up each year. Over time she observed that stock markets tend to go up and down and up again. Admittedly Joan got a little lucky – 10 years ago at 55 when she had cleared off her mortgage, her career was going well and she had a decent disposable income. She saw an adviser who suggested she add more to her pension and ISA, as luck would have it the Government increased the amount she could contribute and she took advantage of 40% tax relief. It was just as well as her State Pension Age was being pushed even further into the future.

Not long afterwards, she started investing into VCTs, (Venture Capital Trusts) well, she had a few friends that had some good business ideas, she had watched The Apprentice and Dragon’s Den and thought a little bit of a flutter was probably ok. She saved into a VCT for few years ago but has since stopped adding money.

Joan has always paid her National Insurance and has a full State Pension which only started in the summer when she was 65, 4 months and 26 days old. Her State pension is £168 a week. She was a bit miffed that it wasn’t 65 (and when she started out at Uni, it would have been 60) but she had enjoyed the benefits of working until 65.

Joan’s Portfolio

£400,000 – Personal Pension Plan
£400,000 – Stocks and Shares ISA Portfolio
£80,000 – VCT (Venture Capital Trust)
£50,000 – Bank Deposit Account
£600,000 – Home

Not an unreasonable sum of money – in fact having paid off her mortgage and owning her home, Joan has savings and investments of £930,000. Her home is not an investment, its where she lives. Though her friends regularly tell her that it is an investment if she sells and moves away from Wimbledon. However what would be the point? her friends all live in the area, she loves going jogging on the Common with some of them. Her mum (91) is still alive and living nearby, though Joan is worried that she may need care at some point and the cost of care in Wimbledon is, well… there may not be much of an inheritance.

Tax Free Allowances

In the current tax year 2019/20. Joan has a personal allowance of £12,500 before she pays any income tax. Her State Pension will use up a lot of this. Income up to £50,000 is taxed at 20% (when the personal allowance is considered).

The VCT is a fairly “high-risk” type of investment, she isn’t paying any money into it any longer, but does enjoy income from it of 3% a year, this is tax free within a VCT. That’s £2,400 a year.

Her ISA is doing well, she has set up a monthly payment from it to her of £4,000 a quarter (£16,000 a year). As this is an ISA, the income that she takes (or capital) is tax free. By way of note £16,000 4% of £400,000.

The State Pension – Joan is caught by equalisation.

Joan originally expected her State Pension to start when she was 60, but following various rule changes and seeking advice in the early 2000’s she realised that it would be later than that. Joan’s State Pension actually began this summer on 6 July 2019. Over the full remainder of the tax year she will have 38 payments of £168 (£6,384) normally in a full tax year it would obviously be 52 weeks (£8,736) but she is one of many women that saw their State Pension Age increased. She’s a little miffed at having an extra 5 years to wait and wanted to know how she can minimise her tax payments.

Joan would like to know how much she could take from her pension without paying any tax. As her other investments are tax free, the only taxable income she has is money from her State pension (£6,384 in 2019/20) the personal allowance is £12,500. She puts £8,154 of her pension into a Flexible Access Drawdown pension. This enables her to take £2,038.50 as a tax free lump sum (25%) and £6,115 as taxable income. So rather like this:

State Pension £6,384 (taxable at 0%)
Drawdown Pension £6,115 (taxable at 0%)
Tax Free lump sum from pension £2,038 (tax free)
VCT income £2,400 (tax free)
ISA income £16,000 (tax free)
TOTAL income £32,927 and NO INCOME TAX

More and Less

The first point to make is that the above is not the maximum income that Joan could have. I simply want to identify some options. She could take more from her ISA, she is entitled to tax free interest on her money at the bank. She could take more from her pension (a larger tax free lump sum and no income from the pension if she was so minded). As an employed income £32,927 in 2019/20 would for most people result in about £7,000 paid in tax and national insurance.

Joan will need advice to adjust her portfolios and determine the most suitable way for her to draw income. Next year she will have a larger State pension, using more of her personal allowance as it will be a full year of income for her (and a likely increase in April).

Annuity Option

When she retired at the start of the year at 65, Joan had investigated using her pension to buy an annuity. She was going to simply take the 25% from her fund and put it in the bank and then use the £300,000 to buy an annuity. As a single person in very good health, she wanted an inflation-proofed income. The best annuity available would guarantee that she receives £9,851 a year rising by 3% a year. Job done. That’s an annuity rate of roughly 3.2%, but the income is taxable. In the first year she would have total income of £16,255 from the annuity and her State Pension, paying tax of £747. Her VCT and ISA income remain the same at £18,400 in all. So her total income would be £34,655 (more) but with tax of £747 (net £33,908) She has £300,000 less on her personal balance sheet and has £981 extra income in the year.

In the second year, she would expect £10,146 from the annuity and a State Pension of £8,736 a total of £18,882, which if the personal allowance remains at £12,500 would mean that £6,382 is taxed at 20% (£1,276.40 tax). Whilst there are good things about an annuity (it’s a guaranteed income) this is also a problem for tax planning as the income cannot be switched off and is taxable.

The purpose of this fictional case study is simply meant to highlight the issues involved, everyone’s circumstances will be different. I have not considered that Joan may live a very long time and whether taking 4% from her ISA is a good idea or indeed if she has a suitable globally diverse portfolio. I have done no inheritance tax planning and no contributions to anything that might get tax relief. Had Joan had other investments, she could also use her capital gains tax allowance. There are lots of options.

Dominic Thomas
Solomons IFA

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TAX FREE AT 65 – IT’S ABOUT TIME…Dominic2023-12-01T12:17:07+00:00

Talking Money…. again

Solomons-financial-advisor-wimbledon-blogger

Talking Money… again

As you will have gathered from the plethora of adverts in the weekend papers and advertising hoardings everywhere, the tax year is coming to a close. This means it is your last chance to use up your 2016/17 ISA allowance of £15,240 or perhaps a Junior ISA for those young enough.

This tax year has had many unwelcome changes, most significantly the pension tapered annual allowance, which has reduced the annual allowance (normally capped at £40,000) to a £10,000. This applies to anyone with “adjusted income” over £150,000. But that doesn’t make you “safe” if you don’ earn £150,000. As the annual allowance is £40,000, the maths starts at £110,000 of income. Pension contributions paid are added to income, indeed any income, be it rent, dividends or interest are all counted. So many may well find that they have exceeded the annual allowance.

Solomons-IFA-Smart-Money-Magazine-March-2017-cover

Deliberate Complexity

Yes, the Government could have made things easier, but why bother when there are so many willing voters who will forget the hassle at the ballot box. In fact, Mr Hammond, the Chancellor has had two opportunities to abolish this utterly ludicrous rule in either in his Autumn Statement or his Budget last week. There are tax penalties and charges if this is exceeded and you don’t have any unused relief from any of the three previous tax years 2015/16, 2014/15 and 2013/14. Pensions have the ability to go back 3 tax years if you exceed your annual allowance.

Shrinking heads?

To provide a little more context – ten years ago, the annual allowance was £215,000 in 2006/17, it rose each tax year to £255,000 by 2010/11. It was then slashed to £50,000 for 2011/12 and remained at that level until 2014/15 when it became £40,000. Today in 2016/17 it is likely to be £10,000 for many high earners.

Of course the Government knows what they are doing, by encouraging us all to save for our retirement and financial independence…. I expect that we will soon hear “lessons will be learned”. Oh and no, this is not fake news, its just unwelcome news.

Clients will be receiving a printed copy of Talking money this week, which has some more facts.

Dominic Thomas
Solomons IFA

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Talking Money…. againDominic2025-01-27T16:08:19+00:00

The Autumn Statement 2016

With a few hours to go Philip Hammond will be delivering his first Autumn statement, perhaps his last too if reports are to be believed that he will scrap them… who knows. In any event here is my quick wish list for the Autumn Statement

My Autumn Statement Wish List

(from a financial services perspective)

Abolish the Lifetime Allowance, which is currently £1m – if you hold more than this in pensions and you haven’t already “protected it” you will suffer an excess charge. Utterly pointless and discourages people from saving for their financial independence. This would also imply scrapping all previous protections.

Abolish Taper Relief – the new rule that has caused a raft of problems for those earning over £150,000 who can end up able to pay less into a pension (and still may suffer a penalty) than can be invested into an ISA. Utter lunacy, creating enormous headache for some.

Abolish Higher Rate Tax Relief – not what you might expect me to say and on the caveat that the two previous points are met. This saves the UK considerable sums, yet continues to offer an incentive to save for a pension.

Abolish Tapered Personal Allowance – either everyone gets one or nobody gets one. At the moment if you earn over £100,000 your personal allowance reduces by 50p for every £1 over £100,000.

Scrap the new Main Residence IHT allowance – just give everyone an allowance of £500,000 and have done with it. What former Chancellor George Osborne created is a shambles of smoke and mirrors.

Re-establish the different systems for Final Salary (Defined Benefits) pension schemes without any annual allowance, restricting total contributions to any pension to a fixed % of income by the employee (it used to be 15%). Vast sums and energy is used by departments in the NHS, Teachers, Local Government etc all creating utterly pointless, time sucking reports about the Annual Allowance and Lifetime Allowance. This is completely unnecessary.

Abolish LISA – another attempt to hit pensions with the high exit charges and daft array of decisions. Scrap this and other utterly pointless versions of an ISA. Have the single ISA allowance of £20,000 invest it however you like.

Stamp Duty – introduced to calm the property market which is now largely locked up with anxiety about Brexit etc. Huge tax take by Government and feels like a mugging. This needs reduced dramatically.

Fair Taxation

Earn it and tax it here. If you or your business generate income here in the UK it should be taxed at UK Corporation tax rates. Take note Google, Starbucks and Mr Green (et al). So all that nonsense for cross transfer pricing must end.

Genuinely Seeking Transparency and Tax Simplification? Have three rates of personal tax 0%, 20%, 40%. Whatever the source (dividends, capital gains, income etc). Huge sums are wasted on preparing numbers for a system that is designed to confuse. People break the rules deliberately or without knowing.

Corporations

Businesses pay corporation tax, this could be the same rates, with different allowances as personal taxation… this might mean busineses would use their revenue to reduce profits, either through inward innovative investments, expenses, employing people or redistributing to shareholders. More innovation creates more value, wealth, jobs….more tax take.

Means-Testing

If you are retired and have an income in excess of say £100,000 you forefeit your State Pension. You also forfeit free travel on public services and also the Winter fuel allowance…. come on, if you have a £100,000 income and don’t work any more, you aren’t going to need it or miss it and a relatively small number of retired people have £100,000 pension.. but really if you are a celeb you can give up your State pension and bus pass.

Landlords

Being a landlord is just like being a business. You have power over where people live. Some vetting is clearly needed (obviously not all landlords are bad). Landlords should have to apply to be a landlord license and register properties and all those living in them. Property has to be inspected every 3 years to ensure it is suitable for real people to live in. The new rules introduced about CGT, Stamp Duty and interest relief need reviewing, fair rents and fair offsets.

Ok, highly unlikely these will happen, but I really think some better ideas from Chancellors are required…

Our APP will be updated by the end of the day with all the relevant changes. It is FREE to have simply search for Solomons Financial Planning on either APP platform. There are loads of free tools and calculators to try out including an expenses tracker.

Dominic Thomas
Solomons IFA

The Autumn Statement 2016Dominic2025-01-21T16:34:24+00:00

Help to Buy ISA… well, not that much help..

Help to Buy ISA…well not that much help

You may have heard of the Help to Buy ISAs. When this was announced by the then master of goalpost manoeuvers, Mr George Osborne, you would be forgiven for thinking that this was an innovative scheme to help savers get a bigger deposit for a house purchase. The Government will add 25% to whatever you save…. Well maybe not.. as ever, rarely do Governments make life easy, indeed one is often left to wonder if Government agenda is not precisely the opposite. So, let’s spell out a few of the issues. For the sake of simplicity, I will call the right to buy ISA “the plan” which will not help my search engine optimization, but will hopefully read a little better.

Maximum and Minimum

You can only save £200 a month into “the plan” with an initial deposit of £1000.The maximum that can be in the plan (from you is £12,000 – the minimum is £1,600). So the maximum £12,000 would get £3,000 (25%) from the Government, yes its better than nothing, but actually not that much help for a deposit. You have to be 16 or over for an account.

So then there is that mortgage…

Whilst it is possible to get a mortgage with a very small deposit (5%) the prevailing requirement is generally 15%-25% deposit. Of course this means being able to justify and afford the mortgage for the balance. So if the plan is 5% of the purchase price, that suggests a property valued at £300,000 and mortgage of £285,000… which in turn probably means an income of over £80,000. We don’t arrange mortgages, but generally borrowers can borrow up to about 3.5x their income. If you have found a property for £100,000 then of course this will be more useful, but one can only assume that the property is at least 100 miles from London.

The Hard Graft of Saving

As the plan is really a monthly saving scheme, that’s a total of 55 months or 4 and a half years of solid saving…. In the meantime, property prices are probably rising, at least in-line with inflation. Oh… just remind me how long is the typical Government lifetime? How time flies.. and policies change.

The Housing Problem

Another clause being that Government hand out only applies if the purchase price is up to £250,000 or £450,000 in London…. In which case for Londoners, clearly this would be just over a 3% deposit, so you will need other resources. The property must be in the UK (do not ask me what that would mean should either Scotland or Wales leave the UK). Naturally the plan cannot be used to purchase a second property, so if Mum and Dad have put your name of the deeds somewhere else… well, it’s not for you.

Meanwhile, as the Help to Buy ISA is really a Cash ISA, the savings earn interest, which today is about nothing. OK you can get some better deals, but not much better.

Snakes and Property Ladders

The Plan cannot be used for anything other than a deposit, not stamp duty, fees etc. It cannot form part of the deposit provided at Exchange of Contracts either…. which is quite daft! It must also be closed before you buy, which means obtaining a statement from the Bank to confirm that the account is closed (which may be easy in theory but hard in the stressful throws of purchasing a first home.. whilst the pressures mount from those higher in the chain.. It’s actually the conveyancing solicitor that claims the Government hand out for you between the Exchange and Completion… (I’m guessing a fee would apply to claim it)… what could possibly go wrong? (property falling through perhaps?).

Still, there’s no place like home….

So is it worth it? Launched nearly a year ago (December 2015) over 22,000 people have used the proceeds to buy a property, which presumably means that they had at the very most 10 months of £200 and £1000 initial deposit (£2000 in all) so a £500 help to buy. OK, ok… better than nothing, but is this really solving the housing crisis or simply providing a bit more cash to meet the inflated property prices? I think you can probably guess what I think.

However, this is money for nothing (well, there are some strings). In practice, perhaps try to use the account, fill it up to the maximum then forget about it in the hope that the offer remains valid for years to come. It does form part of your annual ISA allowance, but in practice only £2400 for most people, meaning that there is still a lot of ISA allowance left. If you move abroad or never end up buying a home, then you can easily get your money back, it simply will not be worth much more than you put in, due to poor rates of interest. Much like the Wizard of Oz, there are no magical solutions to resolve the housing crisis but if you make the effort and reflect on your own resourcefulness, its amazing what can be achieved… and you will have a bit more cash to play around with.

Dominic Thomas
Solomons IFA

Help to Buy ISA… well, not that much help..Dominic2023-12-01T12:19:09+00:00

The Budget 2016

There’s nothing like the Budget to divide people along political lines, I shall refrain from making political statements. All Chancellors perform a merry dance taking from one pocket to give to another, the current Chancellor is no exception (indeed there are none).

Lifetime ISA & Pensions

The stand out issues are that there has been no attack on pension tax relief, as leaked following leaked rumours that it would be. However a new Lifetime ISA looks a lot like a pension – with an effective tax relief of 20% but maintaining the ability to access the money before retirement (before 55). This is much like Individual Retirement Accounts in the US and something that many have called for over the years. The problem is simply that a pension has the advantage of being a long-term lock away pot, there for your retirement. Enabling people to access funds earlier is designed to help homebuyers. On the surface this is a good thing, in practice access to money does not deal with the problem of over-priced housing, if anything it is likely to make things worse (think about it).

That said the ISA allowance is going to rise to £20,000 – which is good news for investors seeking tax-free growth. If I were a cynic I might suggest that these two issues are connected – the prospect of a lifetime allowance for ISAs could be introduced for all. So reading between the lines, the direction of travel seems to be to have 20% tax relief, accessible funds, but restrictions on the value of the pot…. we shall see in the fullness of time.

The Chancellor also appears to have tidied up some of the older tax rules about inherited pensions. When somone dies before 75 with a pension in drawdown, there is no tax to pay by the beneficiaries, after 75 the proceeds are taxed at the recipients marginal rate of tax (which could be 0% or up to 45%).

Pension Advice

The Money Advice Service (funded by levies on financial advisers and pension companies) is to be scrapped, it isn’t working and the name itself is misleading (it’s not advice, but information). I along with many others was peeved about the advertising which suggested a return to the lie that financial advice is free – it never has been and never will be. Given that this was paid for by levy, it felt rather like the biting the hand that feeds. In any event, go-faster stripe paint at the ready… there will be changes (hmm… plenty of opportunity to get some consultants in to test new names, design a logo that will inevitably be less than satisfactory).

Employers that pay for pension advice to employees can currently claim £150 per head without it becoming a benefit in kind (and taxable on the employee) this is being raised to £500 per head. I wonder what might happen…

Capital Gains Tax

The rate of tax payable on capital gains is to be reduced to 10% and 20% (from 18% and 28%) and further suggests a more streamlined approach to taxation, where income taxes and other taxes seem to be at similar rates. I would welcome this as it moves towards a more genuine tax simplification and reduces the number of tax rates, making life easier for planning effectively. The new CGT rates come into effect from 6th April 2016… which will help those lucky enough to nurse some investment gains of late.

Personal Tax

The personal allowance is increasing to £11,000 from 6th April and to £11,500 from 6th April 2017. The amount of income you can earn before the 40% tax rate begins has also been raised. This will not help anyone earning more than £100,000 at which point the personal allowance begins to reduce by £1 for every £2 of income over £100,000.

Small Businesses

Corporation tax is due to fall further, this is a tax tool designed to help encourage enterprise and I think we all welcome actions to stop businesses legally evading tax through transfer pricing etc – the Starbucks or Google loophole looks like one that may be closing…. we shall see.

Small businesses also look set to benefit from rates being cut – which of course is very welcome, its a very odd tax. Business owners do not get to vote for their local authority unlike council taxpayers and many find the costs punitive. Most will be receiving demands this month for the next year and be very pleased at the prospect of a reduction in 12 months time (if I have correctly understood when it will be introduced).

Other stuff… the Budget will be dissected in the media, you will possibly be bored with it already. Of course its important, but the issues invariably are about attempting to make the bad news look good and the good news look “absolutely fabulous” (all Chancellors, all parties). These things tend to come out in the wash… can you remember the Budget from 2011 or 2012? probably not…

Solomons APP

All the changes will hopefully be updated on our APP by the end of the evening. Do let me know how you are getting on with the APP – its full of useful calculators and tools… but only if you use them. Its free to download and use – so do tell others. Don’t forget it works on iphone, ipad and Android.

Dominic Thomas
Solomons IFA

The Budget 2016Dominic2025-01-27T17:02:28+00:00

Estates: Inheritance Tax

So it’s 8th July already and into the second half of the Wimbledon Championships. Looking at your own life, which half do you imagine you are in? (ouch… didn’t see that coming!). Like most people inheritance tax (often referred to as IHT) probably isn’t something that is top of your current concerns (you don’t pay it) however it is a tax that generates more ire than most. In essence, inheritance tax is paid by the Executors of an estate following someone’s death. The amount of tax due will depend on the value of the estate and how it was arranged.

Today the Chancellor will give yet another Budget, but this one, the first as a Conservative Government. Like many I shall be waiting to hear what he says and see how he plans to deliver it. One of the pre-election manifesto promises was to increase the threshold for inheritance tax, perhaps to £1,000,000 for a couples main residence.

He may be less willing to follow through with this now as it was announced that in April HMRC collected £397m as inheritance tax payments, the largest in a single month and way above the longer term average of £260m a month. In fact March, April and May 2015 saw over £1bn of inheritance tax paid to HMRC. If interested, you can see the various taxes collected by HMRC from the data they published at the start of the month, just click here.

The Budget 8 July 2015

We shall simply have to wait for the Chancellor to tell us how and if he intends to adjust the nil rate band (the amount an estate can be worth before any inheritance tax is payable). The nil rate band has been frozen at £325,000 since 2009 and had historically increased with inflation each year, but of course that was before the credit crunch. As ever our APP will be updated with all the changes as quickly as possible (usually before the end of the day). Don’t forget it’s free and easy to use.

Pensions and ISAs are now IHT friendly

The main gripe is that property has continued to soar in value and is invariably the main asset that is left once someone dies. The pension freedom rules have enabled pension funds to be exempt from inheritance tax (though some taxes may apply) and ISAs are able to be passed on to a surviving spouse (previously they would have lost the tax-free status of an ISA).

As a result more people, or rather estates have been brought into the inheritance tax threshold, probably not the original intention of the tax. However the Chancellor will be seeking some wriggle room to keep things as they are given that it raises such significant sums for the Treasury.

A 40% tax rate

As of this morning, inheritance tax is charged at 40% on the excess value of estates worth £325,000. Each individual has a nil rate band and so a couple effectively has a nil rate band of £650,000. In addition, for those that have been previously married to someone now deceased, it is possible to use part of their allowance too.

Dominic Thomas
Solomons IFA

Estates: Inheritance TaxDominic2025-10-06T09:52:24+01:00

The Budget 2015 – A New Mad Max

So, the Budget is already ancient history, the political hoo-hah has been left to fester, tweak and develop into an election manifesto campaign. So what, if anything grabbed my attention?

Jilted Bribe

Firstly, I have to admit that I was expecting there to be a little more of an electoral bribe. Whilst the Chancellor certainly made much of the fact that he wasn’t going to (and thus seek to be understood as prudent or sensible) the truth is that, well… he didn’t really offer a bribe (unless its one I missed). Frankly with the national purse in the shape its in, I was rather glad, (though I remain open to the possibility of solving the problems differently).

ISA with tax relief? – future implied?

That said, the first time buyer ISA does sound like a good idea. The detail needs further examination, but in essence there is 20% tax relief on the annual ISA allowance for people that are 18 or over and don’t (and have never) own a home. £3,000 of the £15,000 ISA allowance will be paid by the Government. Whilst everyone that qualifies will benefit, in practice, this will be a very good way of saving if you qualify… if not you, perhaps your children… opening up further options for more wealthy parents.

Pensions and Politicians… taking the …point?

As for pensions, I have to admit that the utter folly of politicians in relation to pensions has shifted gear over the last 10 years. Whilst knowing that we all need to save more so that there is less reliance on the State system… perhaps even the prospect of a means-tested State pension (who knows?) they are determined to punish successful investing and saving.

Here in the UK we are now restricted on how much can be paid into a pension and how much the pension fund can be worth. Utter madness. Yes £1m is a lot of money, but are we also going to cap how much can be held in a bank account or the value of property? what about the value of a business? These are measures to appear a poorly informed crowd by a poorly informed media. I would immediately abolish the Lifetime Allowance and simply restrict how much tax relief is provided on payments to pensions. It doesn’t have to be more complex than that. However we have a new maximum pot size for your pension. To say that this complicates life further for anyone in a Defined Benefit (DB) pension such as the NHS, would be a masterful understatement. Just so that we are clear… the Lifetime Allowance has reduced from £1.8m to £1.25m already and the Budget has reduced this to £1m in 12 months time. Ok, there will be some form of protection, but if recent experience is to go by, this is about as useful as pushing someone out of an aeroplane with an umbrella instead of a parachute. As for those that put a commercial property in their pension pot… good luck with that! The Annual allowance is now £40,000 a year as the maximum value of contributions to pensions, which may as well be written in algebra when attempting to calculate this for DB members.

Final note: our free APP is updated with all the changes announced for personal allowances, savings rates and so on.

Dominic Thomas

The Budget 2015 – A New Mad MaxDominic2025-01-27T17:04:13+00:00

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