Stamp duty exemption for zero carbon housing

From next year, most new zero carbon emission homes will be exempt from stamp duty and, within 10 years, the Chancellor said all new build homes would be required to be zero carbon emission.

Gordon Brown also announced, as expected, that future planning decisions on major infrastructure projects are to be made by an independent planning body.

In other housing measures, a further 300,000 households are to be offered free insulation and free central heating and another 160,000 families are to be helped onto the housing ladder through shared equity schemes.

The Council of Mortgage Lenders responded cautiously to today's pre-Budget report. CML head of policy Jackie Bennett said, "In theory, we welcome the stamp duty exemption for most newly-built carbon-zero properties. But we will need to see the detail before we can assess the impact of this measure.

"Similarly, the extension of shared equity provision is welcome. But, as the government acknowledges, it is no substitute for tackling the main cause of affordability problems, which is the significant imbalance between housing supply and demand."

Separately, Andy Caton, Corporate Development Director at Yorkshire Building Society said, " As one of the three original participants in the Open Market Homebuy scheme we are delighted to hear that the Government intends to double the target for the number of people being able to purchase their first home under the scheme. We are receiving an increasing number of applications as the weeks go by and have recently had our first completion on the scheme."

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