Madam, - Am I the only person who seems to have a problem working out just how someone receiving money to refurbish a house when they are a tenant can call it a stamp duty issue? I can work out how one might have to pay stamp duty on a house purchase but not on renting it.
If a landlord gives money to refurbish a property that is rented and then agrees to sell it to the tenant, would the house owner not be keen to recoup the money that had been invested in the property before the sale? Then again, if one was going to buy the property, would it not make sense to do the refurbishment afterwards and therefore keep the value of the property lower and perhaps in a lower stamp duty band? And there was I thinking that stamp duty is "given" to the government.
Oh, I am sure there is some perfectly reasonable explanation! - Yours, etc,
JENNIFER MAXWELL, Corballis, Donabate, Co Dublin.
Madam, - I wouldn't for one moment think that there was any thing strange or bizarre in Celia Larkin's and Bertie Ahern's landlord handing her over £30,000 sterling to refurbish the house they were renting from him. Such generosity by landlords in Ireland or even those who live in England is legendary.
I personally know of a landlord who was so kind that he told those to whom he gave money that if there was any left over they should keep it. Is it just possible that our Taoiseach could suggest in his address to both Houses of the British Parliament this month the possibility of having a joint honorary knighthood for kind landlords? They are the forgotten people, the "Mother Teresas" of politicians and their associates. - Yours, etc,
KEVIN WOODS, Carlingford Co Louth