The Tax Maze: Choose Your Own Adventure—If You Can
Yes, a new house or a new condo is taxed, unlike a resale between private individuals: the GST (5%) and the QST (9.975%) both apply to the price before taxes.
Three programs can give part of that back, and they turn on just two things: the price, and whether this is your first home.
What follows reads like those books where you choose your own adventure, with one difference: the amounts were set in another era, and the hero isn't always who you'd expect. Answer the questions, follow the links, and you'll land on one side or the other of the taxes — the side that pays, or the side that gets something back.
The game
Question 1. Will you — or a close relative — live there, or is it to rent out?
- Living there: go to question 2.
- Renting it out: go to ending A.
Question 2. Are you a first-time buyer? By the CRA's definition, neither you nor your spouse or common-law partner can have lived in a home you owned, in Canada or anywhere else, during the current year or the four before it. The spouse disqualifies more often than people think; the full definition is waiting further down.
- Yes: go to question 3.
- No: go to question 4.
Question 3. Was your purchase agreement signed on or after March 20, 2025?
- Yes: go to question 5.
- No: go to question 4. The first-time buyer program doesn't reach back before that date; the two standard rebates, for their part, ask for no date at all.
Question 4. Your price before taxes lands:
- under $200,000: go to ending B;
- between $200,000 and $300,000: go to ending C;
- between $300,000 and $350,000: go to ending D;
- between $350,000 and $450,000: go to ending E;
- above $450,000: go to ending F.
Question 5. First-time buyer, your price before taxes lands:
- under $300,000: go to ending G;
- between $300,000 and $1,000,000: go to ending H;
- above $1,000,000: go to ending I.
A. You're buying to rent
The GST and QST new-housing rebates are reserved for a home occupied by the buyer or a close relative. A property bought to be rented out falls under a different regime, one this page doesn't cover. You leave the game by the side door.
B. Both rebates in full
Under $200,000, you would be entitled to both rebates in full: $9,975 of QST and $6,300 of GST. One small difficulty: of the 94 new projects for which Homz shows a price, not one has a unit at that price, as of August 31, 2026. The least expensive unit in the entire inventory starts at $250,000. If you've found this home, it isn't listed with us.
C. All of the GST, part of the QST
Between $200,000 and $300,000, the GST comes back to you at the full standard amount, $6,300, and the QST in part: that rebate shrinks as the price climbs, all the way to zero. You're in a minority — 12% of the projects in the Homz directory still have at least one unit under that bar, and it's almost always the smallest one in the project. The exact amount turns on your price to the dollar; that's the calculator's job.
D. The GST refunded, the QST paid in full
Between $300,000 and $350,000, Ottawa refunds you the full standard GST amount, $6,300. Quebec no longer refunds anything: its program went dark at $300,000. So you pay all of the heavier tax (9.975%) and recover a share of the lighter one (5%). That isn't a math error; it's the two thresholds refusing to line up.
E. Part of the GST, none of the QST
Between $350,000 and $450,000, only the standard federal rebate is left, and it shrinks with every dollar of price until it disappears. You're in the last bracket where the taxman still hands anything back. Check what that something is worth with the calculator before celebrating.
F. You pay everything
Above $450,000, both standard programs are exhausted: the GST and the QST are paid in full. It isn't that you played badly; it's that the thresholds never kept pace with prices — only 46% of the projects Homz tracks still have at least one unit under $450,000, and each time it's their least expensive one. One check before you close the book: if you last owned a home more than four years ago, reread question 2 — you may have become a first-time buyer again.
G. First-time buyer, under the QST threshold
A first-time buyer under $300,000 recovers all of the GST and part of the QST. The first-time buyer program replaces the standard GST program; the two don't stack, and it's the more generous of the pair. It's also the rarest ending: 12% of the projects listed on Homz have a unit at that price.
H. Ottawa gives it all back, Quebec takes it all
Between $300,000 and $1,000,000, the federal government refunds all of your GST, up to $50,000. It's the only one of the three programs that has kept pace with prices, and 96% of the projects in the Homz directory have at least one unit under its ceiling. Quebec put nothing across from it: you pay the QST in full, and it's the bigger of the two taxes. The good news is federal; the bill stays provincial. Your yes at question 3 carries everything: the program only covers agreements signed on or after March 20, 2025.
I. First-time buyer, past the million mark
Between $1,000,000 and $1,500,000, the first-time buyer GST rebate shrinks to zero; above that, there's nothing left for anyone. The programs were written with other buyers in mind.
Calculate the taxes and rebates for a specific price →
Fine programs, hard market
The useful question is no longer "am I entitled to a rebate?" but "which one do I have left?" (the three programs in detail, if you'd rather have the rule before the market). The QST threshold, at $300,000, now concerns only a sliver of new construction; the savings still realistically within reach play out around $450,000, the standard federal rebate's threshold. The table gives both columns, sector by sector, recalculated from the Homz inventory:
Of the 94 new projects for sale in Quebec whose price is published (as of August 31, 2026, the entry price being the cheapest unit in the project), 12% still have a unit under $300,000 (QST rebate) and 46% under $450,000 (standard GST rebate). Above that, only the first-time buyer rebate (Bill C-4) still tracks prices — the standard rebates were designed for a market that new construction has long since outgrown.
Where new construction still comes in under $300,000: Griffintown (from $250,000), HOMA (from $262,900), Pincourt (from $271,800), Saint-Léonard (from $275,000), Mercier (Montréal) (from $282,000), Saint-Gabriel (from $282,050), Saint-Félix-de-Valois (from $284,000), Sainte-Marie (Ville-Marie) (from $289,900), and 2 more areas.
| Area | Entry price | Under $300,000 QST rebate | Under $450,000 GST rebate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Longueuil | from $394,351 | 0% (0/9) | 33% (3/9) |
| Mirabel | from $353,700 | 0% (0/5) | 40% (2/5) |
| HOMA | from $262,900 | 67% (2/3) | 100% (3/3) |
| Rosemont | from $329,500 | 0% (0/3) | 67% (2/3) |
| Saint-Philippe | from $565,879 | 0% (0/3) | 0% (0/3) |
| Saint-Joseph-du-Lac | from $494,803 | 0% (0/3) | 0% (0/3) |
| Sainte-Marthe-sur-le-Lac | from $465,229 | 0% (0/3) | 0% (0/3) |
| Centre-Ville | from $401,900 | 0% (0/3) | 67% (2/3) |
Above those thresholds, the only relief that keeps up with today's prices is the first-time buyer rebate (Bill C-4): 100% of the GST up to $1,500,000. That one, not the standard rebates, is what covers most new construction in Quebec.
See new projects for sale in Quebec →
Homz data, computed on the inventory of the moment — among the projects whose price is published. The "entry price" is the cheapest unit in the project.
A note on how to read it: each percentage counts projects with at least one unit under the threshold, not homes. A project that counts as 1 may offer a single eligible unit. And the list of sectors where new construction still slips under $300,000 ranks the least expensive by entry price, while the table keeps the most active; a sector can dominate one without appearing in the other.
What about Montreal?
You'd expect the most expensive city to be the one where prices overshoot the rebate thresholds the most. It's the opposite.
| Projects with a published price | Lowest entry price | Under $300,000 QST rebate | Under $450,000 GST rebate | Entry unit studio or 1 bedroom | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Island of Montreal | 29 | from $250,000 | 21% (6/29) | 72% (21/29) | 83% (24/29) |
| Rest of Quebec | 65 | from $271,800 | 8% (5/65) | 34% (22/65) | 18% (12/65) |
A project counts as "under the threshold" as soon as one of its units is. Homz data, new projects for sale whose price is published.
The Island of Montreal is the place in Quebec where the rebates survive best: nearly three quarters of its projects keep at least one unit under $450,000, against a third everywhere else. The reason isn't that Montreal is affordable — its lowest entry price is in the same range as the rest of the province. It's in the last column: on the island, a project's least expensive unit is a studio or a one-bedroom in more than eight cases out of ten; elsewhere, in fewer than two out of ten. The island builds small, and it's the small unit that still slips under the threshold.
In other words, these rebates don't reward an affordable region: they reward a small floor plan. A couple looking for three bedrooms for their family loses the rebate almost everywhere; a single buyer picking up a studio downtown still qualifies.
And even there, the QST doesn't follow: on the island as elsewhere, the vast majority of projects sit above its threshold.
Is any new construction left under the full-rebate threshold?
The QST rebate only reaches its full amount, $9,975, under $200,000. Is there still anything new at that price in Quebec?
None. Of the 94 new projects for which Homz shows a price, not a single one has a unit under $200,000. The lowest entry price in the whole inventory is $250,000, well past the point where the full rebate had already begun to melt away.
So that cap of $9,975 isn't hard to reach: it's unreachable. It describes a new-construction market that no longer exists. What the few still-eligible buyers actually collect is a fraction of that amount, not the amount itself.
The Quebec twist
The first-time buyer rebate is the only one of the three that still tracks today's prices. But it's federal, and Quebec has nothing matching it on the QST side. Concretely: a first-time buyer paying more than $300,000 for a new condo recovers all of their GST and pays all of their QST.
Here's the detail that stings: the QST (9.975%) is the heavier of the two taxes, ahead of the GST (5%). The program that kept pace with the market applies to the smaller tax; the one that applies to the bigger tax stops at $300,000. For the Quebec buyer, that's exactly the wrong side of the misalignment.
Appendices
Are you a robot, or close enough?
Here is the whole rulebook as one tidy piece of pseudo-code, which you may "run" at your leisure. The rates, caps and thresholds come from Revenu Québec, the CRA and Bill C-4, and none of them is copied in by hand — you won't be quoting a stale figure.
To work out the taxes and rebates on a new home bought from a builder and lived in by the buyer or a close relative, first compute the GST at 5% and the QST at 9.975% of the price before taxes, then give every buyer, first-time or not, 50% of the QST back, capped at $9,975, whole while the price stays under $200,000, then shrinking in a straight line to zero at $300,000 and beyond, and finally ask whether the buyer is on their first home with an agreement signed on or after March 20, 2025: if so, give them back the whole GST, capped at $50,000, whole up to a price of $1,000,000, then shrinking the same way to zero at $1,500,000 and beyond; if not, give them back 36% of the GST, capped at $6,300, whole under $350,000, then shrinking likewise to zero at $450,000 and beyond, never stacking the two GST rebates.
You're human and the paragraph above made you dizzy? Good news: we have a machine that runs it for you, and it never skips a line.
Calculate the taxes and rebates for a specific price →
What to check before you sign
Is the listed price before taxes or taxes included, and how is the rebate handled in it? Two projects advertised at the same price can differ by tens of thousands of dollars once that question is settled. Many builders apply the rebate directly in the price and claim it on your behalf; that's legitimate and common, but it has to be written into the contract, not promised during a visit.
If you're a first-time buyer, the real question is the date of your purchase agreement: the federal program only covers those signed on or after March 20, 2025. That date has become the main tax lever for buying new in Quebec.
Who counts as a "first-time buyer"?
The term is more restrictive than it looks, because it takes in your spouse or common-law partner. According to the CRA, you must:
- be at least 18 years old;
- be a Canadian citizen or permanent resident;
- not have lived, as your primary place of residence, in a home that you — or your spouse or common-law partner — owned, alone or jointly, in Canada or abroad, at any time during the current calendar year or the four calendar years before it.
A spouse's or common-law partner's past ownership, including abroad, can therefore be enough to disqualify you.
Conditions, deadlines and forms
For the two standard rebates (GST and QST), the buyers must be individuals; the property must be a single dwelling or a condo; the home and the land must be bought together, from the same builder, under one contract; and it must serve as a primary residence (yours or a close relative's), not a rental.
The application must be filed within two years of the end of the month in which the taxes are deemed paid. In Quebec, it goes on Revenu Québec's form FP-2190.AC (Revenu Québec also administers the GST here), with publication IN-205 as the guide; elsewhere in Canada, through the CRA's forms GST190 (purchase from a builder) or GST191 (owner-built home).
The three programs, defined
The QST, the program on paper. Revenu Québec refunds 50% of the QST, up to $9,975. The full amount holds under $200,000, then shrinks and reaches zero at $300,000. Open to every eligible buyer, first-time or not: Quebec draws no distinction. It's the program the market has outgrown the most: in the Homz inventory, 12% of projects still have at least one unit under its maximum threshold, and 0% a unit at the full amount.
The standard GST, the one that survives in studios. The CRA refunds 36% of the GST, up to $6,300. The full amount holds up to $350,000, then shrinks away by $450,000. It's the path for the buyer who isn't a first-time buyer — and for the first-time buyer whose contract predates March 20, 2025, whom the federal program doesn't cover. In the Homz inventory, 46% of projects still have at least one unit under its maximum threshold, and 21% a unit at the full amount.
The first-time buyer GST, the one that followed prices, but not the right tax. The federal Bill C-4 refunds the full GST up to $1,000,000, or $50,000 at most, then declines to zero at $1,500,000. It only covers purchase agreements signed on or after March 20, 2025, for a home completed within the deadline the legislation sets, and it doesn't stack with the standard program. In the Homz directory, 96% of projects have at least one unit under its full-rebate ceiling.
The GST is 5% and the QST 9.975%. Three rebate programs apply to them, each with its own thresholds:
| Program | Tax | Who | Rebate rate | Maximum | Phase-out | Zero from |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| New home (Revenu Québec) | QST | All buyers | 50% of the QST | $9,975 | $200,000 → $300,000 | $300,000 |
| New home — standard (CRA) | GST | Buyer who is not a first-time buyer | 36% of the GST | $6,300 | $350,000 → $450,000 | $450,000 |
| First-time buyer — Bill C-4 (federal) | GST | First-time buyer, agreement entered into on or after March 20, 2025 | 100% of the GST | $50,000 | $1,000,000 → $1,500,000 | $1,500,000 |
The three thresholds don't line up, and it's that misalignment that decides, at every price, what's left for you. A home between $300,000 and $450,000 keeps a federal rebate while getting nothing more from Quebec. It's the most common misreading.
References
Every statement rests on a primary government source. The rates, caps, thresholds and dates shown on this page all come from a single source kept current on the system side; none is copied by hand into the text.
QST and the QST rebate for new housing (conditions, 2-year deadline, form FP-2190.AC), Revenu Québec:
- Rebate for new or substantially renovated housing (in French): https://www.revenuquebec.ca/fr/citoyens/taxes/remboursement-de-taxes/proprietaires-dune-habitation-neuve-ou-ayant-fait-lobjet-de-renovations-majeures/
- Form FP-2190.AC (purchase from a builder, land included) (in French): https://www.revenuquebec.ca/fr/services-en-ligne/formulaires-et-publications/details-courant/fp-2190-ac/
- Publication IN-205 (the conditions guide) (in French): https://www.revenuquebec.ca/fr/services-en-ligne/formulaires-et-publications/details-courant/in-205/
- GST rebate for the purchase of a first home (in French): https://www.revenuquebec.ca/fr/citoyens/taxes/remboursement-de-taxes/remboursement-tpstvq-pour-habitation-neuve-ou-renovee/remboursement-de-la-tps-pour-lachat-dune-premiere-habitation/
GST and the GST rebate for new housing (forms GST190/GST191), Canada Revenue Agency:
- GST/HST New Housing Rebate (RC4028): https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/forms-publications/publications/rc4028/gst-hst-new-housing-rebate.html
GST rebate for first-time buyers (Bill C-4), CRA and the Department of Finance Canada:
- CRA, first-time home buyers' rebate: https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/tax/businesses/topics/gst-hst-businesses/gst-hst-rebates/first-time-home-buyers-gst-hst-rebate.html
- CRA, "Who can apply": https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/tax/businesses/topics/gst-hst-businesses/gst-hst-rebates/first-time-home-buyers-gst-hst-rebate/who-can-apply.html
- CRA, Excise and GST/HST News No. 122: https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/forms-publications/publications/news122/news122-excise-gst-hst-news-no-122.html
- Finance Canada, royal assent: https://www.canada.ca/en/department-finance/news/2026/03/legislation-to-make-life-more-affordable-receives-royal-assent.html
Market data, Homz: new projects for sale in Quebec for which we show the entry price; recalculated continuously, each value carrying its own date.
Frequently asked questions
Are the GST and QST thresholds the same?
No, and it's the most common mistake. The QST rebate goes dark at $300,000, the standard GST rebate at $450,000. A home priced between the two keeps a federal rebate while getting nothing more from Quebec.
Does Quebec offer a QST rebate for first-time buyers?
No. The only QST rebate is the standard program, already at zero from $300,000. Above that, everyone pays the QST in full, first-time buyers included.
Can I combine the standard GST rebate and the first-time buyer rebate?
No, the two don't stack. Since the first-time buyer program is markedly more generous, it's the one that applies when you qualify for it.
How current are these figures?
As of August 31, 2026. They're recalculated from the new projects for sale published on Homz with a known price, and they update on their own.
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The amounts and calculations on this page are provided as estimates and do not constitute tax, legal or mortgage advice. The programs carry detailed conditions not covered here, and the rules change. Always confirm your situation with Revenu Québec, the Canada Revenue Agency and your notary before completing a transaction.