Afternoon,
Please can someone give use some sensible advice, as I think, I have been listening to the wrong advice.

At the beginning of feb 2011, we purchased a house in London for £1million.
My accountant suggested that I used his strategy to pay 10K instead of 40K. Telling me there was a nine month window for this to be looked into.

13 months on and I am now being told that all these accounts are being looked into and that I will have to pay the 40K after all.

Is what I have done illegal? should I be offering the £40k before George Osbornes boys come knocking at the door.

Could I get arrested?

Thank you

Jay

your conveyancer should have advised you against this procedure as it was obviously dubious in the first place. I hope HMRC get you; there are people sleeping in the streets because people like you are not paying your taxes.

Agree #3 is very hard on the poor guy, though I believe that after tomorrows budget he is probably going to have to pay it all back with interest.
Two points to note from Stamp Duty.
Firstly, the best way to deny HMRC the tax is to buy yourself a nice detached house and live in it for fifty years until you die. This is what I intend to do, and its just what the taxman can't abide, much better for the government if we move house every five or ten years.
Secondly, even quite a normal detached house will set you back £1Million in a nice part of London or Edinburgh. Thats £50,000 and its just legalised extortion for hard working people who only want the best for their families.
The really serious abuse is at the very top end, I'm talking about celebrities, entertainers, singers, (so called, at any rate) who feed their egos by extolling us to give of our time and money to good causes overseas while registering their £10-50 Million homes offshore.

Then like artists Royalties we could perhaps have it extended from fifty to seventy five years.
However the government may then look back in time with envy to the ancient Roman Emperors Tiberius and Claudius. Centurions would arrive at the door of wealthy old men with property, telling him that the best way he could now serve Rome was to die in honour. It was two thirds for Ceaser, one third for the family.

So jj royal thinks a mortgage of £650k doesn't make him rich. Words fail me. I really sympathise with him struggling to survive on what is obviously a paltry salary.

The £12,000 he paid did not go to the treasury - it went to his accountant and possibly other parasites all working really hard to survive.

Just for the record £1 million buys a big house anywhere in London except for a very few select areas.