Mr Etherington said: “It’ll be a no-brainer. That, and the prospect of no more mortgage interest rate relief, which will make it harder to afford to run these properties.
“We could see a bit of a mad rush of owners banking the 10pc tax rate while they still can. It’s a double win for the Treasury. It will lead to more people paying CGT, and light the spark for more property transactions – pushing up stamp duty land tax receipts.”
For second homeowners, the squeeze is already being felt. Local authorities now have the power to double their council tax bills, and the 3pc stamp duty surcharge – introduced in 2016 – has increased upfront costs.
This is why thousands now let their homes to holiday goers when they aren’t there, to benefit from the more generous tax regime Mr Hunt is about to end.
Ben Edgar-Spier, of Sykes Holiday Cottages, said holiday let owners “have been unfairly scapegoated in the guise of controlling rising house prices and availability” in Mr Hunt’s Budget.
He instead pointed the finger at the Government’s “lack of progress” on house building targets, having only overseen the development of 178,000 homes across England last year against a target of 300,000.
Private landlords are another group the Chancellor is hoping will be persuaded to sell up. But for Paul Bonner, a 37-year-old landlord in Warrington with three properties he has bought over the past five years, a change from 28pc to 24pc in CGT won’t be making him run to the estate agent anytime soon.
The father of two uses the majority of his rental profits – a few hundred pounds a month – to pay for childcare as his overall income means he gets no tax-free childcare support.
