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Property tax
What you pay extra on a second home
Three nations, three completely different mechanisms, and the extra worked out in your browser from the published bands.
Buy a property when you will end up owning more than one and there is an extra charge on top of the ordinary tax. That much every guide tells you. What most of them get wrong is that there is no single UK rule: the three nations do it three completely different ways, and a figure worked out for one of them is simply the wrong number in the other two.
| Where the property is | How the extra is charged | The published figure |
|---|---|---|
| England and Northern Ireland | Percentage points added to every band, including the band you would otherwise pay nothing on | 5% on top of the normal rates |
| Scotland | A flat percentage of the whole purchase price, charged on top of the ordinary tax and not sliced into bands at all | 8% of the whole purchase price |
| Wales | No surcharge. The buyer moves onto a separate, higher table of bands from the first pound | 5% from the first pound, rising to 17% on the portion above £1.5m |
Straight to the sources: HMRC on the higher rates, Revenue Scotland on the supplement, the Welsh Revenue Authority on the higher table.
This is not only a landlord's problem. The charge is about how many properties you own at the end of the day you complete, not about why you are buying. Own the old home and the new one on the same day and it is due, even if the old one is under offer and sells a fortnight later.
What the extra comes to
Pick the nation, put the price in, and the difference between an ordinary purchase and an additional property is worked out in your browser from the published bands below.
An estimate from the published bands, worked out in your browser. Nothing you type leaves your device. It assumes the extra applies to the whole purchase, and it does not include the non-resident surcharge. Check the exact figure with the revenue body before you rely on it.
England and Northern Ireland: five points on every band
5% on top of the normal rates. Buy a second property and 5% is added to every band, not just the top one. It catches people who are not investors: if your old home has not completed on the day your new one does, you own two, you pay the surcharge, and you claim it back afterwards. Budget for it even when you expect a refund.
Source: HMRC, read 21 September 2026.
The ordinary bands it is added to, in slices, are on the stamp duty page with the calculator that works them out.
Not a UK resident as well
2% on top, if you were in the UK for fewer than 183 days in the 12 months before the purchase. This one is a day count, not a passport. Fewer than 183 days in the UK in the year before you buy and 2% goes on top of every band. It stacks with the second-property surcharge if both apply to you.
Source: HMRC, read 21 September 2026.
Scotland: a flat charge on the whole price
8% of the whole purchase price. Scotland's second-home charge works differently from England's. It is 8% of the entire purchase price, flat, not extra percentage points on each slice. On a £250,000 second home that is £20,000 on top of the LBTT. Check which country you are buying in before you trust any second-property calculator.
Source: Revenue Scotland, read 21 September 2026.
Because the supplement is a flat percentage of everything rather than points added to the slices, the Scottish charge bites hardest at the bottom of the market, where the ordinary tax is small or nothing at all. Those ordinary bands are set separately by Revenue Scotland, and the calculator above works from them.
The ordinary Scottish bands: Revenue Scotland, read 21 September 2026.
Wales: a different table, not a surcharge
Wales adds nothing to its main table. An additional-property buyer is simply moved onto a different one, and unlike England and Scotland there is no threshold to clear before it bites: 5% from the first pound, rising to 17% on the portion above £1.5m. Wales handles second homes with a whole separate table rather than a surcharge, and it starts at 5% from the first pound. So the three countries do this three different ways: England adds points to each band, Scotland charges a flat 8% of the lot, Wales moves you to another table. Anyone comparing them in one sentence is oversimplifying.
| Price band | Rate |
|---|---|
| The portion up to and including £180,000 | 5% |
| The portion over £180,000 up to and including £250,000 | 8.5% |
| The portion over £250,000 up to and including £400,000 | 10% |
| The portion over £400,000 up to and including £750,000 | 12.5% |
| The portion over £750,000 up to and including £1,500,000 | 15% |
| The portion over £1,500,000 | 17% |
Source: Welsh Revenue Authority, read 21 September 2026.
Replacing your own home, and getting it back
The case that catches people has nothing to do with investing. Your sale and your purchase are meant to complete on the same day. The sale slips. For one day, or one month, you own two homes, and the extra is charged on the one you have just bought. It is then reclaimed once the old home sells, inside a window each revenue body sets for itself.
England and Northern Ireland. 36 months to sell the old home and claim the surcharge back. If the old home has not sold on the day you complete, you own two properties that day, you pay the surcharge, and you claim it back when the old one sells, as long as that happens within 36 months. This is the part that catches ordinary buyers in a chain rather than investors. You are not buying a second home. You just own two for a while, and the tax does not care which it was.
Source: HMRC, read 23 September 2026.
Scotland. 36 months to sell the previous main residence and reclaim the supplement. Scotland runs the same idea under its own law. Sell the previous main residence within 36 months of the new purchase and the supplement is repaid. Before 1 April 2024 that window was 18 months, so an older guide, or one written for England, will tell you the wrong thing.
Source: Revenue Scotland, read 23 September 2026.
Wales. Wales runs its own version of the same relief under the Welsh Revenue Authority, with its own conditions and its own deadline. We have not found a published figure for the Welsh window that meets the standard the rest of this page is held to, so there is no number here rather than a borrowed one. The Welsh Revenue Authority's own guidance is the place to read it.
Budget for it either way. A refund is money that comes back weeks or months after completion. On the day itself the extra has to be found in cash alongside the deposit and the legal bill, and nobody lends against a refund.
The extra is one line of a longer bill
The surcharge, the supplement or the higher table sits on top of the ordinary tax, and all of it sits alongside the legal fee, the searches and the Land Registry fee. The full breakdown is on the conveyancing fees page.
Questions people ask
How much extra stamp duty do you pay on a second home?
It depends which nation the property is in, because there is no single UK rule. England and Northern Ireland add five percentage points to every band. Scotland charges a flat supplement on the whole purchase price. Wales moves you onto a separate, higher table from the first pound. The published figure for each is in the table at the top of this page.
Do you pay the second property surcharge if you are just moving house?
You can. The charge looks at how many properties you own at the end of the day you complete, not at why you are buying. If your sale has not completed on the day your purchase does, you own two homes that day and the extra is due. You reclaim it once the old home sells, inside the window your revenue body sets.
Does this calculator send anything anywhere?
No. It runs entirely in your browser, there is no form anywhere on this site, and nothing you type is stored or sent. It is an estimate from the published bands, so check the exact figure with the revenue body before you rely on it.