The unbeatable tax advantage landlords have over first-time buyers

Our tax system massively favours buy-to-let property buyers over those looking to secure their first home, says Merryn Somerset Web.

How do we make houses more affordable for first-time buyers? How about we start by making them less affordable for buy-to-let buyers?

A new report suggests that landlords are currently subsidised by the rest of us to the tune of some £5bn a year, thanks to the way in which they (entirely legally) avoid paying both income tax and capital gains tax (CGT) on their returns.

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Merryn Somerset Webb

Merryn Somerset Webb started her career in Tokyo at public broadcaster NHK before becoming a Japanese equity broker at what was then Warburgs. She went on to work at SBC and UBS without moving from her desk in Kamiyacho (it was the age of mergers).

After five years in Japan she returned to work in the UK at Paribas. This soon became BNP Paribas. Again, no desk move was required. On leaving the City, Merryn helped The Week magazine with its City pages before becoming the launch editor of MoneyWeek in 2000 and taking on columns first in the Sunday Times and then in 2009 in the Financial Times

Twenty years on, MoneyWeek is the best-selling financial magazine in the UK. Merryn was its Editor in Chief until 2022. She is now a senior columnist at Bloomberg and host of the Merryn Talks Money podcast -  but still writes for Moneyweek monthly. 

Merryn is also is a non executive director of two investment trusts – BlackRock Throgmorton, and the Murray Income Investment Trust.