The amount of stamp raised from sale of homes and other properties in London hit a record £5.6 billion last year, latest official figures reveal.
The total for the year to April 2023 was up 10% from £5.085 billion in the previous year, according to data released by HMRC, enough to pay for about half the entire budget of the Justice Department.
It means that London accounts for 36% of all the stamp duty land tax (SDLT) raised by the Treasury in England and Northern Ireland. Scotland and Wales have their own system of property taxation.
The London total was made up of £4.545 billion on residential sales and £1.055 billion from non-residential deals.
Westminster alone delivered £765 million, the most of any local authority in the country and more than the entire north west region, which includes cities the size of Manchester and Liverpool. It was followed by Kensington & Chelsea with £690 million, and Wandsworth on £340 million.
The amount of stamp duty raised per home transaction in London - and delivered to Jeremy Hunt - also hit a record of almost £35,000, more than double the level of a decade ago.
Nationally receipts were up by 9% from £14.1 billion to £15.36 billion with the south east region chipping in £3.275 billion, second only to London.
Property sales over the £1 million mark - which are concentrated in London and the south east - accounted for just 4% of transactions but half of total SDLT receipts.
Remarkably the 15,700 of £1 million plus sales across London delivered almost £3 billion receipts, or a quarter of all residential SDLT across England and Northern Ireland. Just 4,000 £2 million sales provided two thirds of those receipts.
Stamp duties on London properties have rocketed over the past decade as successive Chancellors have sought to rake in a bigger share of the huge surge in the value of housing in the capital.
The biggest shake-up came in 2014 under George Osborne who introduced a new system and higher rates that meant sales worth more than £937,500 - mainly concentrated in London and the south east - would attract more stamp duty while those below that level would pay less. Agents say the super primce central London property market has never fully recovered from trhe changes.
Buyers currently pay nothing on the first £250,000, 5% on the next £675,000, 10% on the value between £925,001 to £1.5 million, and 12% on anything above £1.5 million. There is also a 3% surcharge for second home owners and buy to let landlords.
Lucian Cook, head of residential research at property advisers Savills, said: “With the stamp duty burden increasingly weighted to higher value properties, London’s housing market has continued to punch well above its weight from a tax perspective.
“Higher mortgage costs and lower activity levels, mean that it will be difficult to match the record revenue raised in this financial year. Despite this, a refocus back to city living, particularly among equity rich buyers, will mean London’s housing market continues to deliver significant receipts for the Treasury this year and next.”
