Jessica Sheldon
One of the key figures you'll need to know before buying a house is how much stamp duty you'll pay on the purchase.
Stamp duty is a tax you pay to the government when you purchase a property worth over £125,000 in England and Northern Ireland – although there are different rules for first-time buyers. The amount you pay depends on the cost of the property.
Stamp duty is one of the UK’s most hated taxes as it increases the cost of buying a property – some even describe it as the “worst tax in Britain” as it limits activity in the housing market.
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It’s not just people in wealthier areas that have to pay it either. Stamp duty is now due on the average-priced home in every English region unless you’re a first-time buyer.
What is stamp duty?
Stamp duty is a tax paid when you buy a property in England and Northern Ireland. It applies to home movers who are buying a property that is over £125,000, and first-time buyers purchasing a home for more than £300,000.
Assuming your purchase is subject to stamp duty, you will pay tax on increasing portions of the property price.
The only instance in which you will not need to pay stamp duty is if the property you purchase costs less than £125,000, or less than £300,000 if you are a first-time buyer.
In April 2025, the threshold at which home movers start paying stamp duty was lowered from a temporarily higher threshold of £250,000 to £125,000, meaning more buyers are now liable to pay the tax.
How much is stamp duty?
How much stamp duty you pay depends on how much the property costs. Different rates apply to different portions of the property cost in England and Northern Ireland.
First-time buyers can get a discounted rate, while buyers in Scotland and Wales face a different form of tax (more on this below). Non-residential property or land is also subject to different taxes and rates.
Here’s what you will pay in stamp duty, depending on the value of the home you’re buying in England and Northern Ireland:
Property cost | Stamp duty rate per band |
|---|---|
Up to £125,000 | Zero |
The portion from £125,001 to £250,000 | 2% |
The portion from £250,001 to £925,000 | 5% |
The portion from £925,001 to £1.5 million | 10% |
The portion above £1.5 million | 12% |
How much stamp duty will I pay on an average home?
The average price of a house in the UK was £269,000 in June, according to HM Land Registry.
Using this average, we can work out the average stamp duty that you would pay if you bought a house at this price.
If someone who is not a first-time buyer were to purchase a house at this price, they would pay £3,450 in stamp duty, paying the 0%, 2%, and 5% rates on different portions of the property cost.
The price of £269,000 is split between three stamp duty brackets. The first £125,000 of the price is tax-free so this will leave £0 of stamp duty.
The next £125,000 of the home’s price is then taxed at 2%, leading to £2,500 in stamp duty.
Then, the final £19,000 left in the house price is taxed at 5%, costing £950 in stamp duty.
Adding these together (0 + 2500 + 950) means the total stamp duty would be £3,450.
You can use this method of calculation to work out how much stamp duty you will pay on any home.
How much is stamp duty for first-time buyers?
First-time buyers in England and Northern Ireland are exempt from paying stamp duty on the first £300,000 of a property purchase before a rate of 5% is applied on any portion from £300,001 to £500,000.
If the property price is more than £500,000, they will pay the normal rates of stamp duty.
Using the example of a £350,000 house, we can see that while a home mover would pay £7,500 in stamp duty, a first-time buyer would pay just £2,500.
Breaking down the calculation for a first-time buyer, we can see that they will pay 0% in stamp duty for the first £300,000 of their property price.
Then, they will be charged 5% on the remaining £50,000 of the house price, resulting in a bill of £2,500.
A table showing stamp duty rates for first-time buyers in England and Northern Ireland can be found below.
Property cost | Stamp duty rate per band |
|---|---|
Up to £300,000 | 0% |
£300,001 to £500,000 | 5% |
Over £500,000 | N/A - first-time buyer rates do not apply to properties over £500,000 |
How much stamp duty do you pay on a second home?
If you are not a home mover and are instead buying a second home, you will usually have to pay 5% on top of the usual stamp duty rates.
The rates of stamp duty for a second property can be found below.
Minimum property purchase price | Stamp duty rate |
|---|---|
Up to £125,000 | 5% |
£125,001 to £250,000 | 7% |
£250,001 to £925,000 | 10% |
£925,001 to £1,500,000 | 15% |
Over £1.5 million | 17% |
If, for example, you buy a second home for the average house price of £269,000, you will have to pay £16,900 in stamp duty.
The first £125,000 of this is taxed at 5%, giving you a liability of £6,250.
The next £125,000 is taxed at 7%, meaning you owe the taxman £8,750 on this portion.
Then, the final £19,000 is taxed at 10%, resulting in a £1,900 stamp duty liability.
Adding all of these up (6,250 + 8750 + 1900) gives you a total stamp duty bill of £16,900.
How much property tax could you pay in Scotland and Wales?
Scotland and Wales have different property tax regimes. The devolved government in Edinburgh replaced stamp duty with the Land and Buildings Transaction Tax (LBTT) in 2015, while the Welsh government replaced it with the Land Transaction Tax (LTT) in 2018.
Land and Buildings Transaction Tax in Scotland
The rates of LBTT are set by the Scottish government and are locked in until 2026. Here’s what the bands look like:
Property cost | LBTT rate per band | Max. you could pay per band |
|---|---|---|
Up to £145,000 | 0% | £0 |
£145,001 to £250,000 | 2% | £2,100 |
£250,001 to £325,000 | 5% | £3,750 |
£325,001 to £750,000 | 10% | £42,500 |
Over £750,000 | 12% | £30,000* |
*Assuming property price of £1 million
*Assuming property price of £1m
First-time buyers are exempt from paying anything up to a value of £175,000.
The average price of a house in Scotland is £215,238, according to Halifax, which would incur a LBTT bill of £1,404 for a home mover.
The first £145,000 is taxed at 0%, so you will get an LBTT bill of £0 for this portion.
The remaining £70,238 left of the property’s price is then taxed at 2%, resulting in a total LBTT bill of £1,404 .
If you were purchasing the property as a first-time buyer, you would instead pay £804 in LBTT, benefiting from the more generous thresholds.
This is as you pay £0 in tax on the first £175,000 of your purchase as the rate is 0%.
You will then pay just 2% on the remaining £40,238 of your purchase price, incurring an LBTT bill of £804.
Land Transaction Tax in Wales
The devolved administration in Cardiff does not offer any relief or reduction in LTT for first-time buyers. Here’s what you will pay in Wales:
Property cost | LTT rate per band | Max. you could pay per band |
|---|---|---|
Up to £225,000 | 0% | £0 |
£225,001 to £400,000 | 6% | £10,500 |
£400,001 to £750,000 | 7.5% | £26,250 |
£750,001 to £1.5m | 10% | £75,000 |
Over £1.5m | 12% | £60,000* |
*Assuming property price of £2 million
The average price of a property in Wales is £227,928, according to Halifax. Buying a house at this price will incur an LTT bill of £175.68.
The first £225,000 of the property price incurs a 0% rate, meaning you pay £0 in LTT.
Then, the remaining £2,928 is taxed at 6%, resulting in a total LTT bill of £175.68.
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