New lodging requirements by the State Revenue Office (SRO)
mean that purchasers must provide more information
You will recall that Victorian laws have recently changed to
only allow 30 days from the date of the transfer of land for any
stamp duty to be paid. Any delay to payment of stamp duty may
accrue interest, so although compliance with the following changes
is simple, a failure to comply could have expensive
consequences.
As part of the suite of documents required to transfer real
estate from one party to another, several documents are required by
Land Victoria and the SRO. The issue is that until duty is paid to
the SRO, the transfer of land cannot be lodged at Land Victoria.
This means that the purchaser will not become the registered
proprietor of a property on the Register until the requirements of
both the SRO and Land Victoria have been satisfied. In a Torrens
system where registration is critical, and can ultimately determine
ownership in the event of a competing claim, it is important that
purchasers move swiftly to become registered on title.
Twelve months ago the SRO amended many of its forms to include
areas for the purchaser's date of birth to be included, where
the purchaser is a natural person. To date, a failure to complete
the purchaser's date of birth has not typically resulted in a
rejected lodgement.
From 7 November 2012, a failure to complete the dates of birth
of all natural person purchasers in one of the accompanying
documents to the transfer of land will be fatal to the lodgement.
Depending on your transaction, the accompanying documents may be
any of the following:
any completed SRO form as suitable for your transaction
a copy of the Notice of Acquisition
a copy of a current driver's licence or other personal
identification including the purchaser's date of birth
a statutory declaration regarding the purchaser's date of
birth
a copy of any loan applications relevant to the transaction,
including the purchaser's date of birth.
The SRO has also advised that:
it will no longer accept undated transfers. A failure to
include the date in the transfer of land will result in a rejected
lodgement
even if a transfer is dated, if settlement has not yet
occurred, the SRO will only provide a written estimate of duty
rather than pre-emptively stamping the transfer with duty.
Purchasers and their representatives should be alert to the
above changes and ensure that all documentation is complete before
attempting to lodge transfers and associated documents with either
the SRO or Land Victoria.
The content of this article is intended to provide a general
guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought
about your specific circumstances.
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Specific Questions relating to this article should be addressed directly to the author.
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