Bought a flat in West Croydon in 1978.
Moved to detached house in Coulsdon in 1982 courtesy of a 5% bank (employer) mortgage when the rates were 15%.

Freelance in 1997 supported by my teacher wife and mortgage free in 2001.
Best thing we ever did was being debt free. Work hard and invest was our credo. Even as a teenager I hated owing anything to anybody and still have the same philosophy today.

As many have said it's easier to spend today than 40 years ago. An expensive night out in 1980 was in the pub. Holidays were booked via a travel agent or Ceefax. No mobiles costing loads per month. Life was simpler.

i am happy you didnt own a property in the path of all that Lava.

i know a fella who owns a house in the UK and another property elsewhere. And he flip flops between the two. Which property will be liable for CGT ? who knows ?

Eze Peasy at Anfield....

You have to pick one as your main resident (you may need to prove it, if challenged). If he sells the one he is residing in and moves into the other one he can avoid CGT altogether.

CGT on residential properties is 28% BTW, not 40% as has been mentioned on here

I apologize is was 40% in England when i was resident.

“That’s a joke son, I say, that’s a joke.” “Nice boy, but he’s sharp as a throw pillow.” “He’s so dumb he thinks a Mexican border pays rent” “ “Son… I say, son, some people are so narrow minded they can look through a keyhole with both eyes.”__ Forhorn Leghorn

Is IHT returned if the giver survives over 7 years or is that just on gifts over a set amount. I mean you could inherit while someone is still alive I guess.

OK....

Firstly, if you sell your 2nd property "now", that triggers a CGT liability, assuming you sell it for a profit. Put simply, the taxable gain is:

What you sell it for, less the costs of selling (eg estate agent, solicitors fees).
MINUS
What you paid for it, including the costs of buying it, plus what you've spent on 'improvements' over and above 'ongoing maintenance' (HMRC has lots of guidance regarding what can be included)
MINUS
£13,000 - the CGT allowance for this tax year and assuming you've no other capital gains this tax year (NOTE: this figure is set to fall significantly over the next couple of tax years).

If you have a joint owner or owners, you and each of the joint owners does the above calculation for THEIR SHARE of the property. Thus a husband and wife (say) would end up protecting £26,000 of the gain from CGT (IN THIS TAX YEAR - less than £26,000 in future tax years, when the allowance is going to reduce).

If you gift the property to your kids (or to anyone), that is treated as a disposal even if no money changes hands. The above calculation therefore still applies, but the first line of it will be based on a valuation of the property's market value at the time of transfer. That valuation will have to be accepted by HMRC, so you can't claim that the value was 50 quid (for example!). I THINK any costs of transferring the property (eg legal fees) can be deducted from the gain, but this would need to be checked. NB HMRC will in any case be "interested" in the value, because 'ad valorem' stamp duty will also be payable - yes, stamp duty is payable on the value of a property on transfer even if no money changes hands. For 'normal' property sales, the price paid by the buyer is generally accepted as the amount liable for stamp duty, but not always so - for example if HMRC determines that the property has been sold for less than the true market value. You can't therefore sell your property to your kids for £100 and avoid stamp duty.

Now to IHT...

Any gift - whether a property or the proceeds of the sale of property in this example - over and above certain annual allowances (lots of detail on HMRC website about what those allowances are), will, as you say, be potentially liable for IHT on death within 7 years of the gift. However, the IHT rate payable on the gift reduces across the 7 years, from 40% on the day of the gift down to 0% on the 7th anniversary. I say "potentially" because it all depends on the size of the estate plus any gifts within the previous 7 years. Put in a simple example: if you have £200,000 of assets and you give half of it away then die a year later leaving £100,000 in your estate, then no IHT will be payable because your estate plus the gift are less than the IHT allowance (£325,000 at present).

I hope this helps.

Palace since 19 August 1972. Palace 1 (Tony Taylor) Liverpool 1 (Emlyn Hughes)