First-time buyer stamp duty: what you actually pay

A first-time buyer pays no Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT), the tax you pay when you buy a property over a certain price in England or Northern Ireland, on the first £300,000 of the price. On a home costing between £300,001 and £500,000 you pay 5% on the part above £300,000. The important catch: if the price tops £500,000, the relief disappears entirely and you pay the standard rates on the whole amount.

Here are the first-time buyer bands for the 2026/27 tax year, in force since 1 April 2025. Each rate applies only to the slice of the price in that band, the same way income tax works.

Who counts as a first-time buyer

The definition is stricter than most people expect. For this relief, a first-time buyer is someone who has never owned a freehold or leasehold interest in a residential property, anywhere in the world. It is not about whether you have bought in the UK before, or whether you have ever taken out a mortgage; it is about ownership.

That catches a few things people forget. A home you inherited counts. A property given to you as a gift counts. A place you owned jointly with a partner or family member counts, even if you never lived there. If you have ever held any share of a residential property, you are not a first-time buyer for SDLT.

When two or more people buy together, the rule is all or nothing: every buyer on the purchase has to be a first-time buyer. If one of you has owned a home before, the relief is off the table for everyone, and the standard rates apply to the whole price. That is worth pinning down before you fix a budget, because it can change the bill by thousands.

The relief bands

First-time buyer relief works by lifting the point at which stamp duty starts. On a standard purchase, tax kicks in above £125,000. With the relief, you pay nothing until £300,000, then 5% on the slice from £300,001 to £500,000. There are only two bands to think about:

• No stamp duty on the first £300,000 of the price.
• 5% on the part of the price from £300,001 to £500,000.

Because each rate only touches its own slice, you never pay tax on the first £300,000 even when the price is higher. On a £450,000 home, for instance, the first £300,000 is free and only the remaining £150,000 is taxed, at 5%. You can work out your stamp duty with your own price, and the calculator shows the slices band by band.

The £500,000 cliff edge

This is the part that trips buyers up, so it is worth saying plainly. First-time buyer relief is only available when the price is £500,000 or less. The moment the price goes over £500,000, the relief vanishes completely. There is no partial relief, no taper, and no keeping the free band on the first £300,000. You drop onto the standard residential rates for the entire price.

It really is a cliff edge, not a slope. At exactly £500,000, a first-time buyer pays £10,000. Push the price to £500,001 and the relief is lost, so the bill jumps to the standard charge of £15,000 on that price, a £5,000 increase for one extra pound on the price tag. If a deal is hovering just above £500,000, it can be worth knowing how close you are to the line before you negotiate.

Worked examples

Three prices show how the relief plays out, including what happens once you cross the cap. All use the 2026/27 figures.

A £295,000 home. The whole price sits under £300,000, so a first-time buyer pays nothing. Stamp duty: £0. A buyer who already owns a home would pay £4,750 on the same purchase under the standard rates.

A £400,000 home. The first £300,000 is free. The remaining £100,000, the slice from £300,001 to £400,000, is taxed at 5%, which is £5,000. Stamp duty: £5,000. Without the relief, the standard rates would charge £7,500 on this price, so the relief saves £2,500 here.

A £550,000 home. The price is over £500,000, so the relief does not apply and the standard rates take over. That is 0% on the first £125,000, 2% on the next £125,000 (£2,500), and 5% on the slice from £250,001 to £550,000 (£15,000). Stamp duty: £17,500, exactly what any other buyer would pay. Being a first-time buyer makes no difference above the cap.

How it differs from standard rates

The relief is not a discount applied to your bill; it is a different set of bands. The standard residential rates, which apply to most other buyers, are 0% up to £125,000, 2% from £125,001 to £250,000, 5% from £250,001 to £925,000, 10% from £925,001 to £1,500,000, and 12% above £1,500,000. First-time buyer relief replaces the bottom of that scale with a single 0% band up to £300,000 and a 5% band to £500,000.

The saving grows as the price rises towards the cap, then stops dead. At a price of exactly £500,000, the relief saves £6,250 against the standard rates, which is the most it can ever save. A pound over the cap and that saving becomes nothing. If your purchase is well over £500,000, our broader guide on how stamp duty works walks through the standard bands and the surcharge in more detail.

One aside on owning more than one home: if you will end up owning an additional property after the purchase, a 5% surcharge is added to every standard band from a price of £40,000. That is a different situation from first-time buying and rarely overlaps with it, since a first-time buyer by definition owns nothing yet.

Stamp duty is only one of the upfront costs of buying. Once you have the number, it helps to see what you can borrow with our mortgage affordability calculator, and how your deposit shapes the deal with the loan-to-value calculator, since a bigger deposit lowers how much you borrow as a share of the price.

Scotland and Wales

Stamp Duty Land Tax, and the first-time buyer relief described here, only cover England and Northern Ireland. The other UK nations run their own property taxes, with their own thresholds and their own first-time buyer rules:

• Scotland charges Land and Buildings Transaction Tax (LBTT), set by the Scottish Government.
• Wales charges Land Transaction Tax (LTT), set by the Welsh Government, which has no first-time buyer relief.

The bands in this article, and in our calculator, are for SDLT in England and Northern Ireland. If you are buying in Scotland or Wales, the figures will be different.

Common questions

What stamp duty will I pay as a first-time buyer?

Nothing on the first £300,000, as long as the home costs £500,000 or less. On a price between £300,001 and £500,000 you pay 5% on the slice above £300,000 and nothing below it. So a £350,000 home means £2,500, and a £500,000 home means £10,000. If the price is over £500,000 the relief drops away and you pay the standard rates on the whole price. Put your own price into the calculator to see the figure.

Do first-time buyers pay stamp duty in the UK in 2026?

Often not. For the 2026/27 tax year, a first-time buyer pays no Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT) on a home costing up to £300,000. Above that, up to a price of £500,000, you pay 5% on the part over £300,000. Only when the price tops £500,000 does the relief disappear and the standard rates apply. SDLT covers England and Northern Ireland; Scotland and Wales run separate taxes with their own first-time buyer rules.

How much is stamp duty on a £300,000 home?

For a first-time buyer, nothing. The relief gives you 0% on the first £300,000, and £300,000 sits right on that line, so the bill is £0. A buyer who is not a first-time buyer would pay £5,000 on the same home under the standard rates: 0% on the first £125,000, then 2% on the next £125,000 (£2,500), then 5% on the final £50,000 (£2,500).

Do first-time buyers get a 50% discount on stamp duty?

No, and it is worth clearing up. There is no flat percentage off the bill. First-time buyer relief works by lifting the tax-free threshold from £125,000 to £300,000, so the saving comes from the bands, not a discount rate. The most the relief can save against the standard rates is £6,250, on a home priced at exactly £500,000.

Who counts as a first-time buyer?

For SDLT, a first-time buyer is someone who has never owned a freehold or leasehold interest in a residential property, anywhere in the world. That includes property inherited or received as a gift, and property you owned jointly. If you have ever held a share of a home, you are not a first-time buyer for this relief.

Do both buyers have to be first-time buyers?

Yes, if you are buying together. The relief only applies when every buyer named on the purchase is a first-time buyer. If one person has owned a home before, no one on the purchase can claim it, and the standard rates apply to the whole price. It is worth checking before you budget, because it changes the bill.

Is there any relief if the home costs more than £500,000?

No. Once the price goes over £500,000, first-time buyer relief does not apply at all, even by a single pound. You pay the standard residential rates on the entire price, the same as any other buyer. There is no partial relief and no taper above the cap.

About this article

Written by the calcd team. We build UK money calculators and explain the numbers behind them in plain English. We checked the thresholds and rates in this article against gov.uk (HMRC), the primary source for Stamp Duty Land Tax and first-time buyer relief. The figures are the rates in force from 1 April 2025, applying for the 2026/27 tax year, and cover England and Northern Ireland only. They are estimates to help you plan, not financial or tax advice. Confirm your own bill with HMRC or your solicitor before you commit. Last updated June 2026.