Canadians polled on home equity tax despite feds promise not to introduce policy: Report

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While the federal government said it was not going to introduce a home equity tax, Canadians were asked their opinion of the measure, according to a report.

The poll was conducted at the same time Prime Minister Justin Trudeau met with home equity tax advocates in Vancouver in June 2024.

“Participants were informed that Canada has something called the ‘principal residence exemption’ which allows Canadians to avoid paying capital gains tax on the sale of their primary home, meaning that capital gains taxes would only apply to people who own multiple real estate properties and sell properties they do not live in,’ said the report Continuous Qualitative Data Collection Of Canadians’ Views, according to Blacklock’s Reporter.

“Asked whether they felt this seemed fair, all believed that it was.”

People in the focus groups said an equity tax would punish hard-working Canadians who paid off their homes.

“Several were of the opinion that saving for a home and paying off a mortgage in Canada required decades of hard work and discipline and did not believe the sale of one’s primary dwelling should be taxed at the same rate as other real estate investments,” said the report.

In April 2024, Trudeau’s cabinet proposed a $17.4 billion increase in taxes on capital gains and promised it would not tax home equity.

“This change will not of course apply to the sale of Canadians’ principal residence which is and will remain fully exempt from the tax on capital gains,” then-Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said at the time.

However, The Strategic Counsel of Toronto, a cabinet pollster, assembled focus groups in private town halls in June to ask about taxing home equity.

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Trudeau attended one meeting in Vancouver with University of British Columbia researchers who were in favour of home equity taxes.

“We can all learn from each other,” Trudeau said in an edited recording released to the public.

“There are countries where rates of home ownership levels are much lower, where people don’t put all their retirement eggs into the home equity basket. Like, the idea you would buy a home, you would pay off the mortgage, and then you would watch the value of it skyrocket and that would be your pension.”