Government suspending mortgage relief...

Fishtits

Regardless of the legality, the horror this will put vast numbers of "innocent" mortgage payers is horrendous. This amongst other policies will finish FF IMHO. So what will they call the "new" party?

I'm apolitical, but have many friends who are FF members, to say they're not happy would be an understatement.

I don't have a solution, we pay them (TD's) crazy amounts to start with, they get pensions whilst still employed (!), get redundancy for being demoted, a Minister (MR Martin) stated publicly that he held on to his permanent and pensionable appointment as a teacher because politics is an unpredictable business? Confident in his abilities obviously - wouldn't last a minute in the private sector

Shame on you all, seriously, you need to look to yourself and ask are you befitting yourself or the country?

While people who have masters degrees graduate,


One word, Wanker.

harsea8

Anyone know if this is going to kick in straight away? For example, my lender takes the money for my mortgage out of my bank account by DD on 10th of the month....will that one be effected or will it be the next payment in June?

Thought I'd post this quote from Irish Independent today that made me laugh..... "Mortgage holders were last night advised to increase the amount they are putting into their bank to cover their mortgage repayments as tax relief will end for all but first-time buyers from May 1"
Like most people have a pot of money lying around just waiting for someone to advise us to put a bit more in the bank for the mortgage....stupid f*cks!

Daithinski

Confusion? What confusion.

"Finance Minister Brian Lenihan says there should be no need for confusion about the future of mortgage interest relief."


"The move has caused widespread confusion, but Mr Lenihan insisted this morning that the change was simple.":eek:

Oh well thats ok then, if you say its simple, it must be simple.

How stupid must the general public be?

If only we had the genius type brain of the mighty Brian Lenihan

BTE72

I rang the revenue this morning and this is what i was told..

We bought our first house in 2002 and first qualified for TRS from 2002 and so were entitled to the higher rate for 7 years from then. Our higher rate was reduced in January to roughly €78 per month.

The revenue informed me this morning that as we moved house in 2005 we would be eligible for TRS for 7 years from then (as this is a new mortgage)so covering us up to 2012. However we are only eligible for the lower rate since it is still 7 years since our first trs application.

Also we had a top up in 2006 for which we will receive trs untill 2013 on that top up value alone.

I was told that my TRS would be suspended and that i didn't need to do anything i.e contact the bank or revenue and that the lender would forward the mortgage info to Revenue for reinstatement.

Also not to expect anything to return to normal until possibly early July

Hope this helps

Darragh29

BTE72 wrote: »

I rang the revenue this morning and this is what i was told..

We bought our first house in 2002 and first qualified for TRS from 2002 and so were entitled to the higher rate for 7 years from then. Our higher rate was reduced in January to roughly €78 per month.

The revenue informed me this morning that as we moved house in 2005 we would be eligible for TRS for 7 years from then (as this is a new mortgage)so covering us up to 2012. However we are only eligible for the lower rate since it is still 7 years since our first trs application.

Also we had a top up in 2006 for which we will receive trs untill 2013 on that top up value alone.

I was told that my TRS would be suspended and that i didn't need to do anything i.e contact the bank or revenue and that the lender would forward the mortgage info to Revenue for reinstatement.

Also not to expect anything to return to normal until possibly early July

Hope this helps

But did you not cease to be a first time buyer when you moved house in 2005??? Did you not become a second time buyer at that juncture and lose your entitlement to tax relief???

Darragh29

Just up on RTE.ie... 57,000 people will lose their interest relief permanently tomorrow...

http://www.rte.ie/news/2009/0430/mortgage.html

Also, relief will be suspended for 321,000 of the 562,000 of the people who currently receive it. Of the 321,000 people who will have their mortgage interest relief suspended tomorrow, 57,000 people will no longer receive it.

As for what will happen to the other 264,000 people who will have their relief suspended tomorrow but may at some point in time in the future, possibly have it restored, this'll be fun!

BroomBurner

I'm foreseeing a lot of cheques written out by Revenue in the future...

My sympathies are also with the frontline civil servants in Revenue who will have to bare the brunt of this mess.

Darragh29

BroomBurner wrote: »

I'm foreseeing a lot of cheques written out by Revenue in the future...

My sympathies are also with the frontline civil servants in Revenue who will have to bare the brunt of this mess.

You get what you vote for.

cd27

There is a real case for helping out people who bought properties at the height of the boom (2002 -2007) but to say that the government should be involved in encouraging property investment is mad. That's what mortgage interest relief does, it encourages irresponsible behaviour and joe taxpayer is supposed to come to the rescue.

Far better to let the market correct, we have too many houses and need to invest in productive outlets. This is what the free market is telling us but others think governments should choose worthy groups and give them money at the expense of others...peculiarly fianna fail me thinks.

This State is on the road to ruin with high spending on this, that and every other group you can think of...it's crazy.

http://libertyireland.wordpress.com/2009/04/27/time-for-a-strike/

Darragh29

cd27 wrote: »

There is a real case for helping out people who bought properties at the height of the boom (2002 -2007) but to say that the government should be involved in encouraging property investment is mad. That's what mortgage interest relief does, it encourages irresponsible behaviour and joe taxpayer is supposed to come to the rescue.

Far better to let the market correct, we have too many houses and need to invest in productive outlets. This is what the free market is telling us but others think governments should choose worthy groups and give them money at the expense of others...peculiarly fianna fail me thinks.

This State is on the road to ruin with high spending on this, that and every other group you can think of...it's crazy.

http://libertyireland.wordpress.com/2009/04/27/time-for-a-strike/

Mortgage interest relief doesn't encourage irresponsible behaviour when it is only available to people who are buying a house to live in. When it is made available to apes who are hoovering up real estate just so they can have more than their neighbour, then yes, I agree, it becomes a part of the problem.

cd27

So being given extra money by the government to make your mortgage cheaper doesn't allow you to get a bigger mortgage and bid more for a property...hmmm....talk about defying the laws of maths.

Sounds like you're in total denial...maybe the taxpayer should have to contribute towards your car, your bike, your holiday as well. Gimme a break.

High tax and spending in this country is out of control. We need to get spending under control fast. Hopefully the bond markets will cut this high spending, high taxing and high borrowing government off from their reckless and irresponsible ways. Once and for all.

The Corinthian

Darragh29 wrote: »

And of course he conveniently forgot about the small little matter of our INSANELY PRICED PROPERTY MARKET, which Fianna Fail encouraged though tax reliefs for builders and developers, against the best advice of everyone. Low interest rates are only worth something if you didn't have to pay over the odds for a roof over your head in this country if you bought during the last ten years.

I take it Fianna Fail forced all you lemmings to buy at said insane prices too?

dan_d

Although I think I'll be able to keep my interest relief straight off, I can safely say that I am absolutely horrified at this. FF need to get out now.What else have they brought in that we are only going to realise in the next few months? I never voted for them, and I didn't buy a house during the boom.What does it take to force them out?We are only paying all this money to finance the salaries of the "top" civil servants, none of us are going to derive any benefit from it whatsoever either directly or indirectly.I think it's time we all said enough.We just don't have the money anymore to keep pouring into the public service wage bill and associated black holes. When are they going to just stand up and tell people that?We can't afford it, bottom line.Deal with it now, not when there's absolutely nothing left.We are making complete fools of ourselves as a country.

BroomBurner

Darragh29 wrote: »

You get what you vote for.

What? Sorry, what now? I expressed my sympathy with the frontline civil servants that have to carry out the legislation that the government enact, and that's your comment? Why bother comment on that at all? Do you know for a fact that every civil servant in Revenue voted Fianna Fáil? That's a massive, sweeping generalisation to make, is it not?

I can understand your terse response to the government, but I can't understand the context of your above statement in relation to my post.

dvpower

cd27 wrote: »

There is a real case for helping out people who bought properties at the height of the boom (2002 -2007) but to say that the government should be involved in encouraging property investment is mad. That's what mortgage interest relief does, it encourages irresponsible behaviour and joe taxpayer is supposed to come to the rescue.

How does this help people who bought at the height of the boom? For those people there is no change in regard to mortgage interest relief; they will still get it as before.

ardmacha

There is altogether too much fuss about this. The government changed mortgage relief so that it was only available to people who bought at the height of the boom and who presumably still have big mortgages. This was a reasonable change in the circumstances. The revenue are inevitably busy as there have been several changes in taxation in recent times and they are not allowed hire more staff. In some cases the revenue cannot determine whether people are within the 7 years or not so they will have to wait for their relief for a month or two until it can be sorted. Yes people will have to pay more in the meantime but money has to be collected, if all you have to put up is paying tax for a month or two to be then refunded later then things could be worse.

cd27

You really would have to wonder about all the hype about this.

dan d says: "Although I think I'll be able to keep my interest relief straight off, I can safely say that I am absolutely horrified at this".

Given that interest rates are at record lows I'd say you've done quite well in the last while dan d. Anyway, if people think about this reasonably there is a happy middle ground that is far more just than the current system.

Think about it, we have a tax system where people pay higher taxes on higher income but then we give it back in the form of rental property relief, pension reliefs, mortgage interest relief, medical fee relief…and the list goes on and on… These reliefs are often available on higher tax rates and are thus more beneficial to higher earners. So my question is, why not cut taxes and abolish all these reliefs once and for all, including child benefit, free fees and all the other middle class tax scams? Lower taxes will benefit all.

David McWilliams has what seems to be a reasonable solution for those now drowning in debt who bought houses in the last five years here. He says:

“One thing we could do immediately is that the State, as part of the recapitalisation of the banks, acts to help those thousands of first-time buyers who are now drowning in debt.

The State could demand, as a condition of recapitalisation, that the banks re-negotiate thousands of mortgages. The principal could be halved now so that the debtor continues to service the debt, but on a much lower amount. This way they don’t default and the bank does not end up with a bad loan. But the debtor doesn’t get away with it. It is not a debt write-off, it is just deferred.

Initially, the State and the bank take the hit on the level of loan deferral. They pay 50/50. But this deferral, which is the difference between the old principal and the new principal, goes to the State so that when these houses finally rise in value again in, let’s say, a decade, the upside goes to the State and a proportion to the bank” (David McWilliams, 28th Jan 2009).

Cutting off all the unjust tax reliefs would be a useful way of cutting spending, cutting taxes and getting the economy moving again. It would also get the government out of the business of central planning, i.e. deciding who gets what. Another word for that is socialism.

http://libertyireland.wordpress.com

BTE72

Darragh29 wrote: »

But did you not cease to be a first time buyer when you moved house in 2005??? Did you not become a second time buyer at that juncture and lose your entitlement to tax relief???

Whether your a 1'st or 2'nd time buyer your still entitled to trs.. There is a higher and lower band rate for the 2 groups. This was brought in last years budget

I am on the lower band.

BTE72

cd27 wrote: »

You really would have to wonder about all the hype about this.
.

http://libertyireland.wordpress.com

The tightening up on TRS is the government raising money to bail out the Rich Developers by saving the banks and buying there debt.

How does it happen..?

They raise taxes.
They cut benefits.
They create levies.
They send out the guards to recover money through fixed penalties.
They get rid of the mechanisms put in place to support families who are forced out to work because they have large mortgages and debt. All of which were freely encouraged by the same government during the good times.
And many more things i'm sure.

The Trs being cut is a big deal to me.. Another €78 per month poorer ontop of another €46 a fortnight poorer with a levy. And also you have to remember about low interest rates that some people are locked in on fixed rates for long terms so they are really screwed.


What is point in solely providing money to to help SME's pay their suppliers and the staff costs..? Starving the consumer of cash so we are less inclined or just can't go out to the shops at the weekend for a shopping spree!

The consumer is being starved of cash to spend.. so small businesses will still suffer.