British Columbia’s home flipping tax took effect on January 1, 2025. Sell a residential property within 365 days of buying it and 20 percent of the profit goes to the province. Sell between day 366 and day 729 and the rate slides toward zero. Sell on day 730 or later and the tax is gone.
A multiplex project sits inside that window more often than people expect. A lot bought in the spring, permitted through the winter, built the next year, and sold unit by unit can close its last sale well inside 730 days. The province wrote exemptions for exactly that case, and most projects qualify. Two common situations still pay: assigning a pre-sale contract, and reselling a finished home you bought from a builder.
The rate, counted in days
The tax is charged on net taxable income, which is the profit after costs. The rate depends only on how many days you held the property.
| Days held | Rate |
|---|---|
| 365 or fewer | 20% |
| 366 to 729 | 20% × [1 − (days held − 365) / 365] |
| 730 or more | 0% |
Source: Province of British Columbia, How to calculate your BC home flipping tax. The rate rounds to the nearest one-thousandth.
The formula means the rate falls every day after the first year. At day 398 it is 18.192 percent. At day 547 it is 10.027 percent. At day 729 it is 0.055 percent, and on day 730 it stops.
The count starts on the day you acquire the property, which the province says is generally the closing date, the day you pay for it. It ends on the day you dispose of it.
What counts as taxable property
The tax reaches any beneficial interest in residential property, or a right to acquire one. The province lists three kinds:
- property with a housing unit on it
- property zoned for residential use, including bare land
- the right to buy under a pre-sale contract, which is what gets assigned
A multiplex lot with an old house on it is in the first group. A cleared lot waiting for a permit is in the second. That is why the builder exemptions matter: without them, every lot flipped through a project would owe.
The province’s own worked example
The calculation page walks through a seller named Jacqueline. She bought a property for $900,000, spent $10,000 improving it, and sold it for $1,000,000 after holding it for 398 days.
| Step | Amount |
|---|---|
| Proceeds | $1,000,000 |
| Minus cost to acquire | $900,000 |
| Minus cost to improve | $10,000 |
| Taxable income | $90,000 |
| Minus primary residence deduction | $20,000 |
| Net taxable income | $70,000 |
| Rate at 398 days | 18.192% |
| Tax owing | $12,734.40 |
Source: Province of British Columbia, How to calculate your BC home flipping tax.
Two details in that table carry over to multiplex sales. The cost to improve is deductible, so receipts for work on the property reduce the bill. And the primary residence deduction is capped at $20,000 and only available if you owned the property for at least 365 consecutive days and lived in it as your main home. Net taxable income can never go below zero; a loss produces no tax and no refund.
Where a multiplex project sits in the window
Count the days from the closing date on the lot to the closing date on each unit you sell. If every unit closes on day 730 or later, the tax does not apply and you have nothing to file. If any unit closes earlier, you are inside the window and you need one of the exemptions below to owe nothing.
The exemptions for builders only work if you file a return. The province says it plainly: you will still need to file a BC home flipping tax return but will not have to pay the tax if you meet the requirements. The return is due within 90 days of the sale. Miss it and the exemption is not available.
The five builder exemptions
The province lists five exemptions for builders, developers and building or renovating activity. Each one requires a filed return.
1. You are a builder or developer. In the ordinary course of your business you buy and sell property to construct buildings on it, or you construct buildings on property held for that purpose, and you held this property with that intent. No construction has to have started on the specific lot before you sell it.
2. A related person is a builder or developer. The related person must be a corporation, partnership or trust. An individual relative does not count.
3. You did building activity on land without housing. On a vacant residential lot, the exemption covers completing the clearing or excavation of the site in preparation for a house, constructing or placing the housing unit, or any other prescribed activity needed to build it.
4. You substantially renovated a housing unit. The province publishes separate criteria for what counts as substantial.
5. You built a new housing unit. This covers demolishing the existing home and constructing a new one, and it covers adding housing units to a property that already has a home, such as a basement suite or a separate unit.
The fifth exemption is the one most multiplex projects use. Tearing down a 1950s bungalow and building four homes is the demolition case. Keeping the house and adding a laneway home is the additional-unit case. Either way, file the return, claim the exemption, and the tax on those unit sales is zero.
A homeowner who co-develops a lot they have owned for years is usually outside the window entirely. Their acquisition date is the day they bought the house, so by the time the new units sell they are past 730 days and no return is needed. The co-development math does not change because of this tax, but the builder partner’s share of the sale does need the exemption.
Two situations that still pay
Assigning a pre-sale contract. The province says pre-sale contracts do not qualify for the exemptions for builders, developers, building or renovating activity or for exclusive use for a commercial purpose. The holding period starts on the day you enter the contract, or the day a contract is assigned to you. The province’s example is a buyer named Jean who signs a $750,000 pre-sale contract on April 15, 2025 and assigns it on January 1, 2026 for $800,000. She held it for less than 365 days, so the rate is 20 percent on the $50,000 gain and she owes $10,000. The primary residence deduction is also unavailable on an assignment, because nobody has lived in a home that does not exist yet.
A buyer who signs for a fourplex unit before it is built is in this position. The deposit rules on those contracts are one risk. The flipping tax on an assignment is another.
Reselling a finished new home within two years. A buyer who closes on a completed multiplex home and sells it 18 months later owes the tax on the gain. The builder exemptions belong to the builder. The buyer can claim the $20,000 primary residence deduction if they lived there for at least 365 days, and the province also lists a set of life circumstance exemptions, each of which requires a filed return.
What this means for each seat at the table
If you are building to sell. File the return within 90 days of each unit sale and claim exemption five. Keep the demolition permit, the building permit and the occupancy record, because those documents prove the housing unit is new. The construction financing draw schedule already produces most of this paper trail.
If you are building to rent. The tax is charged on a disposition. Holding the building and renting it out triggers nothing. If you sell the whole building later, count the days from your lot closing date.
If you are buying a finished unit. Plan to hold for 730 days or plan for the tax. If you may need to sell sooner, the $20,000 deduction and the life circumstance list are the only relief.
If you are assigning a pre-sale contract. Expect 20 percent of the gain in the first year and a sliding rate in the second, with no exemption and no deduction.
The full list of city fees on a Vancouver multiplex is a separate bill from a separate government. This one comes from the province, it arrives at sale, and for most projects the right paperwork brings it to zero.
Sources: Province of British Columbia, BC home flipping tax (overview page); Province of British Columbia, How to calculate your BC home flipping tax; Province of British Columbia, Exemptions for builders, developers, and building or renovating activity; Province of British Columbia, Exemptions from BC home flipping tax; Province of British Columbia, Pre-sale contracts, BC home flipping tax. All pages read September 17, 2026.
David Babakaiff, Co-Founder, VanPlex | PlexRank™ | Profit with Multiplex
