Industry experts have written to the Chancellor urging an extension to the Stamp Duty holiday to avoid a collapse in transactions in the Spring.

It also begs the question about the timing of the upcoming 2% SDLT surcharge for overseas buyers due to come into effect from 1 April 2021. This surcharge will be in addition to the 3% surcharge for additional homes.

We’ll have to wait and see if the letter helps in the ever louder calls for an extension to the Stamp Duty holiday or, even, a delay to the surcharge for overseas buyers.

Some good news - according to HMRC data, for the first time this year the number of completions of residential property topped 100,000 in a month. This represents a 20% increase on what was an unusually busy August anyway.