Land transfer tax, city by city: the real dollar amount

The bill in 61 cities, on the market's actual price

The usual comparisons compute the tax on the same fictional price everywhere. Here, every amount is computed on the city's ACTUAL REFERENCE PRICE (composite HPI, median or average published by its board, dated) — because nobody buys a $500,000 house in Vancouver. Ranked from heaviest to lightest bill.

Amounts rounded to the dollar, BEFORE any first-time buyer rebate (see below). Quebec: provincial base schedule — municipalities may surcharge above $500,000 (Montreal has its own tiers, Laval applies 3%); the shown amount is then a floor. Alberta and Saskatchewan: no tax, only registration fees (title + mortgage with 20% down). P.E.I. excluded (schedule not source-validated on our side).

The method, in full

The schedules. They are those of our closing-costs dossier, validated at the official source (provincial statutes, toronto.ca, municipalities) on 2026-06-26: Ontario 0.5% → 2.5% in brackets (+ identical municipal MLTT in Toronto), B.C. 1% → 2% → 3% (+2% above $3M), Quebec 0.5% / 1% / 1.5% (2026 base schedule, indexed brackets), Manitoba 0% → 2%, New Brunswick flat 1%, Halifax flat 1.5% (HRM rate). Alberta and Saskatchewan have NO tax — we show their actual registration fees.

The price. The reference price published by each city's real estate board — the same as our price dossiers, with its date. The tax is computed bracket by bracket on that price, like income tax: it is NOT "top rate × price".

What the table doesn't show. First-time buyer rebates (below), Quebec's municipal tiers above $500,000 (flagged, never estimated — the exact schedule belongs to each municipality), and special cases (non-residents, transfers between relatives). The official calculation belongs to your notary or lawyer.

Regeneration. The amounts track the prices: on every board update, the city's bill is recomputed (last generated: July 30, 2026). If a schedule changes, we fix it at the source — never silently.

First-time buyers: what gets refunded

Ontario: provincial rebate up to $4,000 (covers the full tax up to ~$368,000). In Toronto, a municipal rebate up to $4,475 is added — combined: up to $8,475.

British Columbia: the First-Time Home Buyers' Program fully exempts up to $500,000 (max saving ~$8,000), partially to $525,000.

Quebec: refundable provincial credit up to $1,400 (TP-752.HA); in Montreal, the Accès Habitation program targets some purchases.

Everywhere: the federal HBTC adds up to $1,500. Details and conditions in our first-time buyer programs dossier.

How to read these figures

The tax is a geography tax. For a comparable purchase, the buyer in Toronto pays $30,310 where the one in Medicine Hat pays $356 in registration fees. Same country, same act — a bill 85 times heavier.

Toronto is unique in Canada: the only city where the tax is paid TWICE (provincial + municipal MLTT on the same schedule up to $2M). On the reference home ($934,000), the bill reaches ~$30,310 — the numbers case for the 905 suburbs, where only the provincial tax applies.

It is paid in cash, after closing. Unlike the down payment, the land transfer tax cannot be financed in the loan: it must sit in the liquid budget, on top of the other closing costs. It is first-time buyers' most forgotten cost — and in Quebec, the municipal bill arrives weeks after signing.

Frequently asked questions