Capital Gains Tax on Self Build

B

Bella23

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Hi, we bought a site in 2005 and built a two storey house over a two and half year period approx. This house was for rental purposes as an investment. We were both PAYE workers and submitted all rents in our tax returns annually. The last tenancy ended on 31/12/2023. We now have decided to sell the house as we are getting older and the house requires some upgrading such as new kitchen and refurb of bathrooms etc. It was a Self Build and we used various tradesmen along the way. We paid for some of services with savings and also had a mortgage to cover other costs.
Unfortunately we cannot find receipts as we did a refurb of our private residence a few years ago and fear the saved receipts may have been discarded erroneously.
is it possible to get an approximate costing per sq m from a body such as SCSI or QS which would be fair and honest for the time it was built, to help us determine what Capital Gains tax is due on the sale. I would appreciate a prompt reply as there is an interested buyer. Thanks in advance for any advice.
 
What month was it completed? Is it in Dublin or outside?

With that I can work out the uplift in the relevant CSO property price index and you could use it by reference to the sale price to work out a theoretical valuation for when it was completed

Otherwise if there was a mortgage there was probably a valuation at some point and the lender may have it on file.
 
Do you not have even a rough idea of what you spent? Your own estimates will look a lot more credible than a retrospective third-party estimate based on average costs.

Remember the average person has slightly more than one breast and slightly less than one testicle
 
Neither historic property price indices nor valuations will remotely approximate to build costs.
 
Thanks for above replies and info.
The house was completed in May 2007 and is situated close to 2km from Tralee town centre. We had a mortgage to cover cost of site and groundworks but we built it using mainly savings and rental income from another property and doing without holidays or luxuries ourselves. Our own reckoning is we spent €230,000 approx on building costs outside of site value. It is a 5 bed detached house with 2 e suite bedrooms.
But in the absence of receipts how can this be proven to Revenue. We are willing to pay our share of CGT obviously but not sure how to proceed.
 
In the absence of receipts, you will probably find it difficult to justify any cost - the best you can do is to try and estimate how many bricks, metres of pipe, etc you required and come up with indicative cost for materials.

Did you use any contract labour - if so, maybe you could ask the contractors if they have copies of the invoiced amount - you did get invoices, didn't you or was it all cash payments?

Your own labour is not an allowable cost
 
yes we used some contract labour for plumbing and electrical, block work and plastering and slating. My husband is/was a woodwork teacher so did the doors, skirting, architrave, kitchen and main roof timbers himself with some help from a labourer, who received cash payments. The money was definitely paid but it’s how to prove it to Revenue or what is acceptable to them. I totally appreciate all your replies.
 
jpd said:
In the absence of receipts, you will probably find it difficult to justify any cost
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Why do you say this? Doesn't the general presumption of honesty mean that they're ok if they use a truthful and credible estimate?

jpd said:
- the best you can do is to try and estimate how many bricks, metres of pipe, etc you required and come up with indicative cost for materials.
Click to expand...
Good luck at this stage trying to do that and trying to price it accurately on the basis of 2005 prices, specifications and products.
jpd said:
Did you use any contract labour - if so, maybe you could ask the contractors if they have copies of the invoiced amount - you did get invoices, didn't you or was it all cash payments?
Click to expand...
Few if any contractors will have kept sales records from 18 years ago. Fewer still will want to go to the trouble of rooting them out for Revenue to pore over.

The OP should be getting professional advice on how to handle the CGT.
 
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Yes that’s the problem. Some of those trades people are retired by now and I’m sure it would be impossible to get receipts from others as it’s so long ago. How to proceed? I’m sure it’s a common enough problem so there must be solution.The house didn’t grow on the site and surely a credible estimate would have to be acceptable. I just don’t know where to go with it.
 
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