Buyers may be allowed stamp duty honeymoon

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Chancellor Alistair Darling is looking at the idea for a pre-Budget report that is likely to be brought forward to October. Under the plan, buyers would still have to pay the tax, which adds thousands of pounds to the cost of buying a home, but they could delay it for a period.

Stamp duty bites particularly hard in London where a couple buying a three-bed semi in the suburbs for £390,000 are stung with an extra bill for almost £12,000.

Mr Darling said he was studying ideas to help families cope with the slowdown. "It's important that we are straight with people," he said. "We are going through a tough time and that's likely to continue for a while. The key is to do everything we can to help ourselves and others to get through it."

No decisions have yet been taken, indicated Treasury sources, but Mr Darling has made clear he wants to help first-time buyers, many of whom are keen to buy but have been locked out of the market by the increased requirement to put down big deposits in the wake of the credit crunch.

Stamp duty is one of the biggest headaches they face. It is charged at one per cent on homes costing £125,001 to £250,000, then at three per cent on properties between £250,000 and £500,000, and four per cent over £500,000.

As Chancellor, Gordon Brown increased the rate of stamp duty in successive budgets, raising more than £6 billion last year before the slump. In recent Budgets, the threshold was raised to assuage anger among homebuyers and Mr Darling axed stamp duty on shared equity homes, until the buyer purchases more than 80 per cent.

Another priority is to help families cope with higher fuel prices, but the Treasury has strongly played down the idea of a windfall tax on energy giants.

Mr Darling revealed in an Evening Standard interview recently that he plans to launch a new type of tax-free savings scheme to encourage young couples to save for a deposit on a house, based on existing ISAs.