Spotted by TBH in This Is Money:
Second home owners who have registered their properties as businesses are set to land an £85million windfall from the Government's small business grant scheme.
Experts said the loophole allows the owners of second homes – many of which are registered in Devon, Cornwall, the Lake District and in seaside towns such as Scarborough – to register them as businesses as long as they 'make them available' to let for 140 days of the year* and take bookings for at least half of those days.
The practice, known as 'flipping', allows the property owners to pay business rates instead of council tax. It also means they are eligible for the Government's small business rates relief scheme, which means all but the largest properties pay little or no tax.
Owners are now also poised to collect a share – around £1,300 each – of £2.2billion support for small businesses closed due to coronavirus restrictions. According to commercial property adviser Altus Group, there are more than 62,000 properties in England which are classified as holiday homes and have been flipped** to become 'commercial' premises for tax purposes.
It is not the first time that the owners of second homes have benefited from Government handouts during the coronavirus crisis...
* The official name for this is "Furnished Holiday Lets" and is a set of insane (and fiddly) tax reliefs for second home owners.
** No doubt many of them will be flipped back from Business Rates to Council Tax when the Business Rates exemption ends - Council Tax is usually much lower. I wonder if they will ever publish that statistic.