Readers' forum : Home and studio

My client is an elderly artist who operates his studio at home. Apart from the bedroom kitchen and bathroom the entire house is devoted to his studio and every other room has a considerable number of his works stored in them all of which are available for sale. When the client dies will it be possible to claim business property relief on that part of the house devoted to studio and storage?

For many years the client has provided HMRC with self-employed accounts for sales of his artistic works and the expenses in producing these.

Query 19 044– Artist.

Reply by Terry ‘Lacuna’ Jordan BKL Tax

The categories of ‘relevant business property’ are set out in IHTA 1984 s 105 (1) and the key question is whether the property falls within s 105 (1) (a) as ‘property consisting of a business or...