Underused Housing Tax: Do You Still Have to File in 2026?

On this page

• Is the UHT Still in Force? What Budget 2025 Changed
• Which Years You Still Have to File For: 2022 Through 2024
• Affected Owners vs Excluded Owners: How to Tell Which You Are
• The Exemptions That Reduce the Tax to Zero, But Not the Filing
• How the 1% Tax Is Calculated When It Does Apply
• Penalties for Not Filing, and the Reduced Minimums
• Filing a Late UHT-2900 Now, Including Voluntary Disclosure
• UHT vs BC Speculation and Vacancy Tax vs Vancouver Empty Homes Tax
• FAQ: The Underused Housing Tax
• Unsure If You Missed a UHT Year? Send Us Your Ownership Details

Is the UHT Still in Force? What Budget 2025 Changed

Short answer, because this is what almost everyone is here for:

Yes, you still have to file for 2022, 2023 and 2024 if you had an obligation and never did. Those three years were not forgiven. The returns are still due, the penalties still apply, and CRA has not announced any blanket amnesty.

So the real question for most people reading this in 2026 is not “do I file this year.” It is “did I miss one of the three years that still count, and what happens now.”

If you are a Canadian who owns residential property personally, you almost certainly never had to file. If you own residential property through a corporation, a partnership or a trust, including a bare trust, you may well have had to file for 2022 and never realised it. That is the group with exposure.

Here is how to work out where you stand.

 

Calendar year	UHT return required?	Tax payable?
2022	Yes, if you were an affected owner	Yes, unless exempt
2023	Yes, if you were an affected owner	Yes, unless exempt
2024	Yes, if you were an affected owner	Yes, unless exempt
2025	No	No
2026 onward	No	No

The UHT was a 1% annual federal tax on vacant or underused residential property, aimed primarily at non resident non Canadian owners. In practice it swept in a very large number of Canadian owners who owed nothing but had to file anyway to say so, which is why it was described in Budget 2025 as inefficient and scrapped.

The elimination is forward looking only. It does not clean up the past.

 

Which Years You Still Have to File For: 2022 Through 2024

The deadline for each year was April 30 of the following year. So:

Year	Return was due
2022	April 30, 2023, later extended to April 30, 2024 with penalty and interest relief
2023	April 30, 2024
2024	April 30, 2025

All three deadlines have passed. If you had a filing obligation for any of them and did not file, the return is late as of today and the penalty is accruing conceptually whether or not CRA has contacted you.

The 2022 year is the one that catches people, because the rules were new, the definitions were confusing, and the group required to file was at its widest that first year.

 

Affected Owners vs Excluded Owners: How to Tell Which You Are

This is the whole ballgame. Excluded owners never file. Affected owners file, even when they owe nothing.

Excluded owners (no filing obligation) generally include:

• Individuals who are Canadian citizens or permanent residents, holding the property in their own name, not as a trustee or partner
• Publicly traded Canadian corporations
• Registered charities, cooperative housing corporations, municipalities, hospital authorities, universities and school authorities
• Indigenous governing bodies
• From 2023 onward: specified Canadian corporations, partners of specified Canadian partnerships and trustees of specified Canadian trusts

That last bullet is the crucial one. Those three categories were affected owners for 2022 (so they had to file a return, even though they owed no tax) and became excluded owners from 2023. That single change is why so many Canadian owned corporations have exactly one missing UHT return, for 2022, and none after.

 

Affected owners (must file) generally include:

• Non resident, non Canadian individuals
• Any corporation incorporated outside Canada, and for 2022, Canadian corporations too
• Anyone holding residential property as a partner of a partnership or as a trustee of a trust, including a bare trust, for 2022
• Individuals holding property as trustees, in any year

A bare trust example that caught hundreds of BC families: parents on title to help an adult child qualify for a mortgage, where the child pays for everything and is the true owner. The parents are trustees of a bare trust. For 2022, that made them affected owners with a filing obligation, for a property they never thought of as theirs.

 

The Exemptions That Reduce the Tax to Zero, But Not the Filing

An affected owner who qualifies for an exemption still files. The exemption zeroes the tax, not the return. This was the single most misunderstood part of the whole regime.

Exemption category	In plain terms
Primary place of residence	The property is your or your spouse’s or your child’s primary residence (individuals only)
Qualifying occupancy	Occupied for at least 180 days in the year in qualifying periods of at least one month
Specified Canadian corporation, partnership or trust	Canadian controlled, for 2022 filings
Newly constructed	Construction not substantially completed before April of the year, or completed and offered for sale, never occupied
Not suitable for year round use	Seasonal cabins and similar
Uninhabitable	Due to disaster or major renovation, with time limits
Vacation property	Located in an eligible area and used by the owner or spouse for at least 28 days in the year
New owner	You acquired the property during the year and did not own it in the previous nine years
Deceased owner	Relief for the year of death and the following year, and for co owners and personal representatives

If more than one applies, you pick one and claim it. You do not stack them.

 

How the 1% Tax Is Calculated When It Does Apply

For a year where you are an affected owner with no available exemption:

Tax = 1% × taxable value × your ownership percentage

The taxable value is the greater of:

• The property’s assessed value for property tax purposes for the year, and
• Its most recent sale price on or before December 31 of that year

You can elect instead to use fair market value, supported by an appraisal, by filing the election (Form UHT-2002) with the return. That is worth doing when the property has fallen in value since purchase, and pointless otherwise.

Example. A non resident owns 100% of a Vancouver condo assessed at $850,000, bought in 2019 for $700,000, vacant all of 2024, no exemption available.

Taxable value (greater of assessment and last sale price)	$850,000
Rate	1%
Ownership share	100%
UHT for 2024	$8,500

Note that this is on top of BC’s Speculation and Vacancy Tax and, in the City of Vancouver, the Empty Homes Tax. Three separate taxes on the same empty condo, from three different governments, with three different declarations.

 

Penalties for Not Filing, and the Reduced Minimums

The late filing penalty is the greater of:

• A minimum amount, and
• 5% of the UHT payable, plus 3% of the UHT payable for each complete month the return is late

Type of owner	Minimum penalty, per property, per year
Individual	$1,000
Corporation, partnership or trust (non individual)	$2,000

These minimums were reduced from the original $5,000 and $10,000, and the reduction applies back to 2022. That was a meaningful climbdown, but $2,000 per property per year still adds up quickly for a corporation holding three rental properties across three unfiled years.

One more thing worth knowing. If a return for 2022 or 2023 was not filed by April 30 of the year after, certain exemptions can be denied entirely, and the tax becomes payable even where an exemption would otherwise have applied. Filing late is not neutral.

 

Filing a Late UHT-2900 Now, Including Voluntary Disclosure

If you have found an unfiled year, the order of operations matters.

1. Work out whether you were actually an affected owner for that year. A very large number of people who panicked about UHT never had an obligation at all. Check 2022 separately from 2023 and 2024, because the rules changed between them.
2. Get a UHT number if you do not have one. Individuals without a SIN need an ITN, and corporations need a UHT program account attached to their business number. This step takes time, so start here.
3. Determine the exemption you are claiming, and gather what supports it: occupancy records, leases, utility bills, the property assessment.
4. Consider the Voluntary Disclosures Program before filing. If CRA has not contacted you about UHT, a successful VDP application can get the penalties waived. Filing the late return first, on its own, gives up that option.
5. File Form UHT-2900 for each property for each year, separately. One form per property per owner per year. Co owners each file their own.

That step 4 is where professional advice actually pays for itself. The difference between a plain late filing and an accepted voluntary disclosure on three properties across three years is, at the minimum penalty rates, around $18,000.

Maxpro Financials handles UHT catch up filings and Voluntary Disclosures applications for owners in BC and Alberta, including the bare trust situations that generated most of the 2022 exposure.

 

UHT vs BC Speculation and Vacancy Tax vs Vancouver Empty Homes Tax

These three get confused constantly. They are separate taxes, with separate declarations, separate deadlines and separate rules.

	Underused Housing Tax	BC Speculation and Vacancy Tax	Vancouver Empty Homes Tax
Level of government	Federal	Provincial	Municipal
Status	Eliminated from 2025	Still in force	Still in force
Where it applies	All of Canada	Designated BC areas	City of Vancouver only
Rate	1% of taxable value	0.5% for BC residents and Canadian citizens or PRs, 2% for foreign owners and satellite families	3% of assessed value
Who declares	Affected owners only	Every owner in a designated area, every year	Every owner of Class 1 residential property, every year
Deadline	Was April 30	Around March 31 each year	Early February each year

The critical point: the end of the UHT changes nothing about the other two. If you own property in Vancouver, Burnaby, Surrey, Victoria, Kelowna or the other designated areas, you still have a BC declaration to make every spring, and failing to make it means the tax is charged at the higher rate by default. That one is not going away.

 

FAQ: The Underused Housing Tax

Do I have to file a UHT return for 2025? No. The UHT was eliminated for 2025 and all later years.

I never filed for 2022 but I am a Canadian citizen who owns my home personally. Am I in trouble? Almost certainly not. Individuals who are Canadian citizens or permanent residents holding property in their own name were excluded owners and never had to file.

My corporation owns a rental property. Did we have to file? For 2022, yes, even if the corporation was fully Canadian owned and owed nothing. From 2023 onward, a specified Canadian corporation became an excluded owner and did not file.

I am on title for my child’s condo to help with the mortgage. Does that count? For 2022, potentially yes, as a trustee of a bare trust. That was the most common surprise obligation in BC.

What is the penalty if I file three years late? The minimum is $1,000 per property per year for individuals and $2,000 for corporations, partnerships and trusts, or more if tax was actually payable. It is per property, per year.

Can I still claim an exemption on a late return? Sometimes. Certain exemptions for 2022 and 2023 are denied if the return was not filed by the April 30 deadline of the following year, which can convert a nil return into an actual tax bill.

Is the Voluntary Disclosures Program available for UHT? Yes, and it is usually the right route if CRA has not yet contacted you. Apply before filing the late returns, not after.

Does the UHT repeal mean I get a refund of tax I already paid? No. Tax properly payable for 2022 through 2024 stays payable. The repeal is prospective.

Do I still have to file the BC Speculation and Vacancy Tax declaration? Yes. It is unaffected, it is due every spring, and missing it results in the tax being charged at the foreign owner rate until you correct it.

I sold the property in 2023. Do I still have to deal with this? Yes, for the years you owned it. Selling does not extinguish an unfiled year.

 

Unsure If You Missed a UHT Year? Send Us Your Ownership Details

The UHT is over, but the cleanup is not. The properties that generate real exposure are the ones held through a corporation, a partnership or a bare trust, and the year that matters most is 2022, when the filing net was at its widest.

Maxpro Financials will review your ownership structure for 2022 through 2024, tell you plainly whether a return was ever required, and if one was missed, handle the Voluntary Disclosures application and the UHT-2900 filings. If you were never an affected owner, we will tell you that too, which is often the most useful answer.

Book a consultation or call BC +1 (778) 951 1269 / Alberta +1 (403) 437 6016.