The country's real estate community is "still baffled" by the potential impact of a value-added tax (VAT) on the industry, according to a realtor and Bahamas Chamber of Commerce and Employers Confederation (BCCEC) official.
Speaking with Guardian Business, Chairman of the BCCEC Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) Committee and Bahama Island Realty Sales and Marketing Associate Matt Sweeting stated that members of the real estate sector are still "in the dark" following a seminar hosted by the BCCEC and Ministry of Finance earlier this week.
"The real estate community is still baffled by how [VAT] is going to affect them to a large degree. The sector is still very much in the dark, even though we had a two-hour presentation," stated Sweeting.
Sweeting claimed that several transaction scenarios remain unclear following the presentation, specifically those between VAT registrants and non-VAT registrants.
"Transactions between a non-VAT registrant and a VAT registrant brokerage are unclear. The non-VAT registrant is not required to pay VAT, and he may be associated in a sale with someone that is a VAT registrant, who is required to pay fees on their commission. There are still a lot of misconceptions," said Sweeting, noting that Ministry of Finance officials were unable to adequately resolve the issue.
"It's still unclear on how it's going to work. The suggestion is that whoever the VAT registrant is they're going to be responsible for the entire portion of the VAT fee," said Sweeting.
Despite these ongoing concerns, Sweeting remains optimistic of the continued education efforts of the BCCEC and Ministry of Finance.
"While the government may not have done the best job in getting the message out there, what [the chamber] has done is reach out to their membership, put all of the stakeholders in one place, and develop experts within our own chamber circle to get this information now disseminated," said Sweeting.
The BCCEC unveiled the members of its VAT task force last week, which will lead multiple educational outreach programs throughout the country.
The four-member task force is comprised of BCCEC CEO Edison Sumner, Fidelity Bank President Gregory Bethel, immediate past president of the Bahamas Institute of Chartered Accountants (BICA) Jasmine Davis and Bahamas Aluminium Manufacturing chief Andrew Rodgers.
VAT will be implemented at a rate of 7.5 percent on January 1, 2015. However, the VAT task force will continue to work with local businesses until mid-2015.

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