Empty Home & Speculation Tax Calculator

Three separate vacancy tax regimes exist in Canada, and they are routinely confused — but only one of them currently touches a Burnaby property.

• Vancouver Empty Homes Tax (EHT): A City of Vancouver municipal bylaw. Applies only inside Vancouver city limits. Burnaby is not the City of Vancouver. Full stop.
• Federal Underused Housing Tax (UHT): A 1% annual federal tax on vacant or underused homes, primarily targeting non-resident and non-Canadian owners. Eliminated for 2025 and later tax years by Budget 2025 / Bill C-15 (Royal Assent March 27, 2026).
• BC Speculation and Vacancy Tax (SVT): A provincial tax covering designated Metro Vancouver municipalities — including Burnaby. This is the one every Burnaby owner needs to understand, plan around, and declare every single year.

The practical outcome for most Burnaby owners: one vacancy tax to monitor (SVT), zero municipal EHT, and the federal UHT now gone. Getting your municipality right is the difference between a single tax and a potential double — or in prior years, a triple — stack.

Vancouver's Empty Homes Tax was introduced in 2017 as a City of Vancouver bylaw. It levies 3% of assessed taxable value annually on residential properties that are left vacant — defined as unoccupied for more than six months of the reference year without a qualifying exemption.

The EHT has been held at 3% since 2021. City council reversed a planned increase to 5%, so the current rate is 3% and remains there as of May 2026. Owners in Vancouver must file an annual EHT declaration (the 2025 reference year declaration was due February 3, 2026, with payment due April 16, 2026).

Who it does NOT cover

Burnaby, Richmond, Surrey, Coquitlam, New Westminster, and every other Metro Vancouver municipality — regardless of how close they are to Vancouver — are not subject to the Vancouver EHT. There is no equivalent municipal empty-homes bylaw in Burnaby. A vacant Burnaby condo is simply not subject to this tax.

The BC Speculation and Vacancy Tax is a provincial tax levied annually on property owners in designated taxable regions who do not pay their fair share of BC income tax or who leave properties vacant. The SVT covers essentially all of Metro Vancouver — Burnaby included — with the exception of Bowen Island.

2026 rates (effective January 1, 2026)

• 1% of assessed value — Canadian citizens and permanent residents who are not members of a satellite family
• 3% of assessed value — foreign owners, untaxed worldwide earners, and satellite families

Both rates exactly doubled from the amounts that applied to tax years 2025 and earlier (0.5% and 2% respectively). The rate increase was confirmed in BC Budget 2025 and took effect January 1, 2026. The top rate is already legislated to rise further, to 4% for foreign owners and untaxed worldwide earners starting in 2027.

This is the single most consequential piece of SVT compliance that owners miss: the annual declaration is not optional, even for owners who are completely exempt.

• Every owner listed on title in a taxable region must file a declaration for their ownership share by March 31 each year — whether or not they owe any tax.
• If you live in the property as your principal residence, you still declare. If you have a tenant, you still declare. If you received a full exemption last year, you still declare again this year.
• If you miss the deadline, the province automatically assesses you at the top SVT rate — 3% for 2026 — and your exemptions are not applied. No exemption is automatic.
• More than 99% of BC homeowners end up owing nothing, but only because they declare and establish their exemption status.

Most BC homeowners qualify for an exemption — the obligation is to claim it through the annual declaration, not to assume it applies automatically.

The two most common

• Principal residence: The property is your primary home for the year. Both citizens and foreign nationals can qualify (though the foreign owner rate is higher when this exemption does not apply).
• Tenanted property: The property is rented to an arm's-length tenant for at least 6 months of the calendar year for residential use. Short-term vacation rentals do not count.

Other exemptions

• Recent purchase — you acquired the property during the tax year.
• Owner in medical or long-term supportive care.
• Probate — the registered owner died during the year and the estate is being administered.
• Property under active construction or major renovation with valid permits.

The federal Underused Housing Tax was introduced in 2022 as a 1% annual tax on the value of vacant or underused residential property in Canada — primarily targeting non-resident and non-Canadian owners, as well as certain corporations, partnerships, and trusts.

Budget 2025 (Bill C-15) received Royal Assent on March 27, 2026, and eliminated the UHT for 2025 and all subsequent tax years. There is no UHT return to file and no UHT owing for any year from 2025 onward.

But 2022–2024 still stand

UHT returns for the 2022, 2023, and 2024 tax years remain in force. If you had a filing obligation for any of those years, those returns and any tax owing still apply, along with CRA penalties for late filing. If you are uncertain about past years, consult a tax professional.

For Burnaby properties purchased or held from 2025 onward: the federal UHT is simply not a factor. The calculator above reflects this — UHT is shown as $0 for all scenarios.

For a Burnaby property today, only the SVT applies. But for a City of Vancouver property, the exposure is meaningfully higher — and before 2025, a foreign owner could have faced three layers at once.

• Burnaby, vacant, non-exempt, 2026: SVT at 1% (citizen) or 3% (foreign). EHT: $0. UHT: $0. One tax.
• City of Vancouver, vacant, non-exempt, 2026: EHT at 3% + SVT at 1% (citizen) or 3% (foreign). Two taxes on the same home.
• City of Vancouver, foreign owner, vacant, 2024 (historical): EHT 3% + SVT 2% + UHT 1% = potentially 6% of assessed value. Three taxes stacked.

Knowing which municipality your property sits in is not a technicality — it is the difference between a single, plannable annual tax obligation and a double-stacked bill. For Burnaby owners, the planning conversation is almost entirely about the SVT: declaring on time, understanding exemption criteria, and accounting for the new 2026 rates.

The following worked example uses an assessed value of $1,500,000, a property that has been vacant all year, and no qualifying exemptions — the worst-case scenario that illustrates maximum exposure.

For comparison: under the old 2025 rates, the same property would have been assessed at $30,000 (2% foreign) or $7,500 (0.5% citizen). The 2026 doubling is real and material.

And for context on the municipality difference: an identical $1,500,000 condo inside the City of Vancouver — vacant, foreign owner, 2026 — would face SVT $45,000 plus EHT $45,000 = $90,000. Burnaby exposure is exactly half, purely because of the municipal boundary.