6.5 Property Taxation and the Real Estate Market (the closing

analysis) Holding costs — annual house-and-land tax discourages idle hoarding; Transaction taxes — registration/deed fees on transfers raise transaction prices and invite UNDER-DECLARATION — the chronic valuation-gap problem (the honest-revenue debate); Capital gains — income tax on property gains (the Ncell capital-gains litigation's field: the Court's full bench addressing the duty to assess and recover tax on an offshore share transfer); The calibration problem — heavy transaction taxes thin the market; under-taxation of holding fuels speculation — the policy trade-off to close the answer with. Exam Focus Long question (the unit is one): "Explain the objectives and legal provisions as to assessment, payment and recovery of wealth tax, house and land tax, and house rent tax" — the three-column structure: for EACH levy, its objectives, its legal home, and the assessment-payment-recovery chain. Short questions: stock vs. flow; integrated property tax; the under-declaration problem; rent as investment income. Trick areas: (i) House and land tax is a LOCAL levy (post-federalism); rent tax is FEDERAL income tax — the pair the examiner splits; (ii) Nepal has no broad net-wealth tax — say so honestly; the objectives question is answered with the CLASSIC design; (iii) Stock vs. flow: the holding vs. the earning.