Most first homes to be exempt from tax

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First homes will be mostly exempt from the land and buildings tax as the Finance Ministry mainly seeks to gain additional tax income from commercial property, says Finance Minister Apisak Tantivorawong.

"Residential units will be waived under the new tax bill, but landlords and homeowners who own more than one unit will inevitably be taxed for the units they own for commercial purposes," he said.

If a property is a first home but is expensive, it means the owner has high purchasing power and cannot avoid being taxed, he said.

Mr Apisak declined to give further details but Deputy Prime Minister Somkid Jatusripitak previously told the media that home prices starting from 50 million baht would be taxed.

Mr Apisak said the law would increase the country's tax income by 30-40 billion baht a year.

The new tax will seek cabinet approval soon and take effect next year.

The Treasury Department has done land appraisals for 12.9 million plots out of 32.1 million nationwide, said director-general Chakkrit Paraphantakul.

"We have made new appraisals in Bangkok and Greater Bangkok as well as other big cities first as they are in areas where we could see more changes in land prices in line with economic activities," he said.

The department is set to seek an extraordinary budget of 1 billion baht to complete the other 19.2 million appraisals on time.

The current property tax will be amended to reduce the complexity of the building items from 51 items to only five.

The new land and building tax was initiated decades ago but has never been imposed due to strong opposition from landlords.

The law almost succeeded in Abhisit Vejjajiva's government but the government was dissolved. Former finance minister Sommai Phasee then revived it but Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha demanded a change in details to lessen public opposition.

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