General description

From 1 April 2018, LTT replaced Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT) on residential and non-residential property and land interests purchased in Wales. The tax rates and tax bands for LTT vary depending on the type of transaction.

Taxpayers must notify the WRA of all land transactions with a value above £40,000. There are also circumstances where certain lease transactions are not notifiable if they are less than 7 years in duration. When filing an LTT return, the organisation paying the return has 30 days after the effective date to submit and pay the return.

This dataset includes estimates of LTT notifiable transactions received by the WRA by the close of 16 December 2024.

Care should be taken with any comparisons over time which involve data from spring 2020 to summer 2021. This is due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and changes to LTT rates. A national lockdown on 23 March 2020 resulted in the housing market being mainly closed from this date until 22 June 2020 when it partially re-opened. The market was re-opened more fully on 27 July, to coincide with a change in LTT rates effective until 30 June 2021. There is evidence some purchasers may have brought their transactions forward to June 2021 to benefit from the temporary tax reduction.

There were some changes to LTT rates effective from 22 December 2020. Non-residential transactions and higher rates residential transactions were affected.

The main residential rates and bands for Land Transaction changed for transactions effective after 10 October 2022.

The dataset includes a breakdown by:
- transaction type: residential (including sub-categories for main rate and higher rate transactions), non-residential
- transaction value: values grouped into the different bands for which different rates are charged
- measure: number of transactions, tax due, value of property taxed
- effective date (month, quarter and year)

For some transactions we are unable to provide any detail other than the total tax due figure in the year, as there is a risk of revealing details of the individual transactions. Therefore, these transactions are omitted from all breakdowns and instead summarised here: https://statswales.gov.wales/Catalogue/Taxes-devolved-to-Wales/Land-Transaction-Tax/landtransactiontaxstatistics-tax-due-including-transactions-restricted-detail

Note that because the value bands differ for residential and non-residential transactions and so there is no viable band breakdown for the total across the two.

Note also that where a new non-residential lease is granted, there may be both a purchase element and a rental element. The rental elements are a different concept, shown separately, and not included in the non-residential or overall totals (which reflect the purchase elements only).

Data collection and calculation

See weblinks

Frequency of publication

Monthly

Data reference periods

Data are shown by the month, financial quarter (quarter 1 is April to June) and financial year (April to March) in which the transaction was effective. Where part quarters and years are shown, these are marked with the suffix "to date."

Users, uses and context

These statistics have been established to meet the immediate user requirement for data on the implementation of LTT, following the establishment of the WRA. Our key users are colleagues from the Welsh Treasury within the Welsh Government, the Office of Budget Responsibility, and other tax authorities in the UK.

Rounding applied

Values in this dataset are rounded to the nearest 10 transactions, nearest £0.1 million tax due, and nearest £1 million for the value of property taxed.

Revisions information

Land Transaction Tax statistics are regularly revised and the values for the latest period are provisional. When filing a LTT return, the organisation paying the return has 30 days after the ‘effective date’ to submit and pay the return. The effective date is when the tax becomes liable to be paid, usually when a transaction is completed on a property. Additional LTT transactions relating to the most recent month are therefore likely to be filed during the following month. See weblinks for analysis of these revisions.

Values for earlier periods are subject to revisions for several years. Transactions can be amended for a variety of reasons and the statistics are revised each month to reflect amendments to transactions. In particular, this will be due to higher rate refunds. When a refund for higher rates residential LTT is claimed, the original transaction is amended to a main rate residential LTT transaction. The taxpayer has up to three years to sell their previous main residence and claim a refund.

Title

Land Transaction Tax statistics, by transaction type, transaction value, measure and effective date

Last update

20 December 2024 20 December 2024

Next update

30 January 2025

Publishing organisation

Welsh Revenue Authority

Source 1

Land Transaction Tax returns, Welsh Revenue Authority

Contact email

data@wra.gov.wales

Designation

None

Lowest level of geographical disaggregation

Wales

Geographical coverage

Wales

Languages covered

English and Welsh

Data licensing

You may use and re-use this data free of charge in any format or medium, under the terms of the Open Government License - see http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence

Weblinks

https://gov.wales/land-transaction-tax-statistics
https://gov.wales/quality-information-land-transaction-tax-statistics
https://gov.wales/funding/fiscal-reform/welsh-taxes/land-transaction-tax

Keywords

Land Transaction Tax; LTT; Tax

Statistical quality

See weblinks

Name

WRAx0003

Dataset

OData (JSON) https://statswales.gov.wales/Download/File?fileName=WRAX0003.zip

Metadata

OData (JSON) https://statswales.gov.wales/Download/File?fileName=WRAX0003.xml

Dimensions

OData (JSON) https://statswales.gov.wales/Download/File?fileName=WRAX0003_dimensions.csv

Items

OData (JSON) https://statswales.gov.wales/Download/File?fileName=WRAX0003_dimensionitems.csv