A B.C. Supreme Court ruling will send shock waves through the arm of the Canadian real-estate market that is powered by foreign capital, say immigration lawyers. […]
The B.C. decision is a stark warning to real estate agents, notaries and lawyers who fail to ensure that sellers of properties are truly tax residents of Canada, said David Lesperance, a tax and immigration lawyer based in Toronto.
“This truly is a game changer,” said Vancouver immigration lawyer Richard Kurland.
“It’s a precedent. Real estate agents can now get a knock on the door from the taxman, asking for the (capital gains) taxes that should have been collected by Ottawa, because the agent failed to make adequate inquiries.”
Good news that hopefully will burst the housing bubble that drives a lot of inflation. Realtors are overpaid crooks, who along with appraisers and banks drive up the price of housing so it’s only affordable to the wealthy.
Glad we cashed in. Good-bye, locusts! Too bad they’ve bought up so much valuable ah land and resource rights in the hinterland, but at least they’re going to be disinclined (for the time being) twds playing poker with our housing mkt
My wife briefly did Real Estate law, the risks were high and she only made $300 on a regular deal. Plus you had to assume everyone was sloppy on their paperwork.
Glad we cashed in. Good-bye, locusts! Too bad they’ve bought up so much valuable ag land and resource rights in the hinterland, but at least they’re going to be disinclined (for the time being) twds playing poker with our housing mkt.
You can sure say that again . . . . . . No . . . . Wait . . . . . you already did.
Why is it “good news”? All this is, is government looking out for government. The government of Canada cares not about Canada; only that the taxes are collected. Morons who still believe govt is there to benefit anyone or anything outside o government, ate the reason we are so completely boned.
Everyone you have ever voted for or donated to is your enemy. You simply still don’t know that.
Why on earth did the CRA go after >>>the buyer>>seller’s
This will send about as much of a shockwave as yesterday’s fart. There’s an old expression: when you build a new mouse trap, the mice get smarter.
Besides, as Kevin points out, this is just another example of government hammering citizens for not doing the job it is supposed to do. That’s the way it works in Canada – everybody from furnace repairmen, to septic system pumpers, to mechanics have been coerced/forced/fooled into being part of the great “squeal, or else” complex. Just like block commissars in Havana.
Why on earth did the CRA go after >>>the buyer>> when the taxes are owed by the seller?
Generally, you can make more money selling your property with the help of a realtor than without it, so their services are well worth the money.
Canada should take a page from Denmark: Only Canadian Citizens should be able to own property in Canada.
Unlike Obama’s disgusting FATCA tax grab, it’s difficult, if not impossible, to enforce any nation’s tax laws on another nation’s residents…unless they return to Canada.
CRA probably already sent a tax bill to Shanghai (or wherever the seller resides). And that resident decided he’d keep the money rather than ever visit Canada again.
Since he didn’t pay, CRA demanded the current owner pay, which CRA can do.
I know. Life isn’t fair.
Because they can. The CRA’s job is to get money for the rest of the government to spend (on … government.) There’s no point going after a seller who has got their money out of Canada. But someone who has a non-portable asset in Canada is a pretty easy squeeze.
They go after the seller because, under the Income Tax Act, a Canadian who pays taxable funds to a non-resident is responsible for witholding taxes and remitting them to the CRA. The amount is 15% to treaty countries, 25% to non-treaty countries, and 25% on income from property. I’m now guessing but the tax would be applied on half the net capital gain.
…Only Canadian Citizens should be able to own property in Canada….
Damned Straight…and while we are at it….let us return to the days where you must be a legal Landed immigrant for 10 Years before you are considered WORTHY of becoming a Canadian citizen.
Which one of you Conservative hopefuls will take THAT as part and parcel of your platform…??
This watered down bullshit of 3 years and not one inkling or desire to even learn our language(s)…has simply got to change.
“Generally, you can make more money selling your property with the help of a realtor than without it, so their services are well worth the money.”
Ummm…wrong.
Only a realtor would say something like that.
I have bought and sold many properties. Some with realtors and some without. When I don’t use a realtor I have a lot more negotiating room, still sell for the market value and save the 10-20 grand.
Grade 5 math taught me that. Turns out going to school helped.
Here’s the equivalent of a T4, T5, etc slip for funds paid to foreigners.
http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/E/pbg/tf/nr4/nr4-15e.pdf
Next step; it’s raycis to refuse to sell/buy to/from a non-citizen. The section 13 stazi are waiting. After raycis comes islamophobic. And after that is the death penalty, which they will bring back exclusively for section 13 complaints. Which have never failed to serve the sacred narrative.
“The immigration lawyers urged the B.C. government to end the “honour system” that leaves it largely up to sellers to state on real-estate-industry forms whether or not they are residents of Canada for tax purposes.”
Honour system? Guess what the flaw in the “honour system” is.
Generally, you can make more money selling your property with the help of a realtor than without it, so their services are well worth the money.
It depends”
We are on house number 7 0ver 50 years of moving to different towns to work, we have always made money on our homes, and only once had some grief.
The outlier was when we used a realtor, sloppy contract, took the two realtors to small claims along with the two homeowners.
I recovered our costs and the cost of the stolen chattel (hot tub) from them.
We found that a sincere buyer, with a minimum 5% nonreturnable deposit, a offer to purchase from their lawyer, to be vetted by our lawyer, works well for all concerned.
We have always dealt honestly and committed to a process that is fair to all concerned.
I would never write a contract, that is for my lawyer, or sign one he has not approved by my lawyer.
Average cost for selling, buying 1200-to-1500 dollars.
Bottom line is a honest and competent lawyer who specializes in real estate.
There’s nothing like a good fake crisis to justify increasing taxes.
We are all tax collectors. We are all tax collectors….. Is that your primary residence? Actually it’s not…. so pay the tax collector.
On the bright side, increased government spending increases its capacity to borrow, so actually it’s all free, like health care.
I fail to see the big problem of foreigners buying super-expensive housing in places like Vancouver or Hogtown. The sellers are generally people who will then be well enough off to be cut-off the entitlement roles in a few years when the boomers are collapsing the bankrupt Canadian welfare state. Means-testing for income and net worth is only a few Spawn terms (endless deficits) down the road. Unaffordable housing is an entirely political problem and somewhat self-correcting.
As for realtors, I’m with Bubba Brown.
Herein lies the problem with globalization. It isn’t a level playing field. FAIR trade doesn’t exist. Super Rich Oligarchs from every corrupt nation, with no labor laws or environmental laws, let alone functional governments … come to Canada and America to launder their fortunes in our real estate … whilst appropriating OUR Tax advantages. The average Canadian/American gets priced-out of their own countries. Borders no longer seem to have any meaning. Only “populists” like Trump/BREXITers seem to “get it”. This isn’t going to end well for our nations until we are put back on a LEVEL playing field. I am getting weary of PAYING for the liberal/white guilt for having built beautiful nations that lifted so many of our population into a comfortable middle class. Let the other nations of the world BUILD their own societies from the ground up.
Does not matter if you like realtors or not. The ruling is absurd. I know you don’t like them because you got your little inflation conspiracy theory all worked out but tell me how is the realtor supposed to verify if the person who sales realestate is a tax resident in Canada? And why should this be realtor’s responsibility in the first place?
“And why should this be realtor’s responsibility in the first place? ”
Perhaps the Canadian Revenue Agency should verify residency within one business day. If the seller objects he could appeal and get a refund.
Another weird thing along these lines is that, if you have a business, you could be denied claiming an input credit on GST paid to someone not registered for GST. It is your responsibility to determine their GST number is valid at the time of purchase.
Idiots are perfectly fine with tax regulations running to 97 volumes, 890,000 pages total. But it is all goid; colonista has no problem with 300,000 new pages of regulations every day. As long as he is only inconvenienced less than 363 days a year…
Exactly what straw man are you valiantly fighting against now?
The foreigners should pay the same capital gains rate as the rest of us: 0%
That’s 0% only when one’s real estate transaction qualifies for 0%, although that’s a fair point.
Foreign buyers take the same risk as everyone else, and oftentimes the biggest risk is government intervention in the marketplace.
Those who work from home, or derive income from a portion thereof, may also have arse-puckering tax obligations which bear closer scrutiny for all concerned.
PMPETrudeau stated that ‘The state has no business in the bedrooms of the nation’®, and so it’s entirely appropriate that they be excluded from revenue calculations, especially since they’ve been sadly unproductive in their reproductive business capacity.
Kitchens, otoh, are workplaces (ask any housefrau/beau).
A fair means of determining capitol gains tax on ALL real estate3 transactions would be to apply capital gains tax to the area in a dwelling occupied by kitchens* – regardless of paltry factors like citizenship.
It’s the one room people hate sharing, and danged furriners would pay a tax premium for ‘wok/curry’ kitchen kitchenettes.
(*with apologies to those in the kitchen cabinet sales industry, in any capacity)
The influx of foreign buyers has raised the value of homes owned by Canadians. Why is this a bad thing.
Real estate agents mostly provide a very valuable service to their clients – some don’t. That’s no different than any other vocation.
Correct on both counts.
There is a very simple way to reduce housing prices: create more supply. True, in Vancouver this is difficult due to obvious geographic restrictions. In Moronto it is entirely self inflicted. Getting rid of greenbelt and building houses that people want, instead of the stack on, high density future townhouse ghettos, would have would have brought prices down to affordable level.
“Piss off. You have no business deciding who I sell property to.”
And yet people of your ilk are the first to scream bloody murder when a christian baker refuses to bake some f@gs a cake.
same crew of experts in here that don’t understand highest and best use.
When in doubt, LISTEN, rather then bull$hit!!!
It becomes a bad thing when demand from foreign buyers with much more money than Canadian buyers inflates the value of your home to the point that most of the market (Canadians) can’t afford it. This shrinks the market for your home to a much smaller pool of potential buyers. If you have by then gotten yourself into a financial situation that relies upon the inflated value of your home being realizable and suddenly it isn’t, you discover that the better things get, the worse it will be if they go wrong.
“Piss off. You have no business deciding who I sell property to.”
You’re playing a libertarian again? How cute. So I take you are also opposed to the idea that all houses put on market have to go through the mandatory energy efficiency assessment?
“This shrinks the market for your home to a much smaller pool of potential buyers. ”
Only because they are willing to pay you more than others. Yes in the end your house goes to the highest bidder. That is a good thing. That means you get more money.
People coming to Canada to leave their money here in exchange for goods is a good thing too. Yes I know they are all commie collaborators and mostly criminals. No you cannot make money in China without bribes and stealing. F*** that, it is a Chicom problem. Give me your money you filthy commie rats.
And no you do not have a right to affordable housing in a downtown of your choosing (you do not have a right to affordable housing period but that is besides the point). Idiots living in West Coast sewer sentenced themselves to unaffordability. Good, serves them right. Let them move east of Burnaby and enjoy a three hour commute one way. Your shiny happy green gulag is expensive, and since you do not like highways it is imposable to get though. Marinate in your own juices, morons.
You simply still don’t know that.
I’m always amused to be lectured to by someone half my age or younger.
You’ve clearly never been to Houston … where a complete lack of zoning regulations allow your next door neighbor to build a 12,000 sf factory with 75 employees right next door to your $ 144k single family residence. I would have thought YOU of all people would applaud government regulations … like basic zoning laws ?
“People coming to Canada to leave their money here in exchange for goods is a good thing too. Yes I know they are all commie collaborators and mostly criminals. No you cannot make money in China without bribes and stealing. F*** that, it is a Chicom problem. Give me your money you filthy commie rats.”
I see what you are saying, but a caveat is in order — caveat venditor. Gaining money but losing control — to Chinese Communists — is loaded with potential problems. Observed Josef Stalin (D., GA), “He who pays is master.” You are fortunate enough to have escaped Communist masters. Don’t let the bear — or the panda — get a paw in the door.
This is why I opposed Stephen Harper’s decision to allow the Communists to take over Nexen — China’s largest foreign acquisition at $15.2 billion.
When it comes to strategic industrial initiatives I fully agree. But a house in suburbia isn’t strategic. A chicom coupe outbidding others on a townhouse in Mississauga is not affecting geopolitical balance.
But that is a separate matter entirely. People who are opposed to chicoms buying real estate are not concerned about strategic issues. Not at all. They just bitch because housing prices are going up and they are outbid on the house they feel should be cheaper. Because they have right to cheap $hit. Others should not want the $hit they want because that makes $hit more expensive. They would like things to be cheaper so they could buy more. And they blame those who have more. They are nothing but frustrated losers filled with envy. As far as I am concerned they are welcome to take a solitary journey to the land of self fornication.
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