Blog > Ontario's New Home HST Rebate in 2026: Who Qualifies, How Much, and What Has to Happen Before Closing
Ontario's New Home HST Rebate in 2026: Who Qualifies, How Much, and What Has to Happen Before Closing
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If you sign an agreement to buy a newly built home in Ontario on or after April 1, 2026 and on or before March 31, 2027, and you are buying it as a place to live, you can get back up to $130,000 of the HST. That is up to $80,000 of the 8 per cent provincial part through the Ontario enhanced new housing rebate, plus up to $50,000 of the 5 per cent federal part through the Ontario new home affordability payment. You do not have to be a first-time buyer. The maximum applies to homes priced up to $1.5 million, and it phases out between $1.5 million and $1.85 million.
That is the headline. The part that decides what actually happens on your closing day is different, and it comes down to one question: will the builder credit the rebate to you at closing, or will you have to pay the tax and get it back from the Canada Revenue Agency months later. Those two outcomes feel nothing alike when you are the one wiring the money.
Here is how the programs fit together, what you get at each price, the dates that decide eligibility, and what to ask a builder before you sign anything.
There are three programs, and they are not the same thing
People talk about this as one rebate. It is actually three, they come from two governments, and which ones apply to you depends on when you signed and whether you have owned a home before.
1. The Ontario enhanced new housing rebate
Ontario announced this on March 25, 2026. It rebates 100 per cent of the 8 per cent provincial part of the HST on an eligible new or substantially renovated home, up to a maximum of $80,000. It is for homes bought from a builder for use as your primary place of residence, or your relation's. There is no first-time buyer requirement.
This sits on top of the old rules rather than replacing them. The existing Ontario new housing rebate, capped at $24,000, is what remains for anyone the enhanced rebate does not reach.
2. The Ontario new home affordability payment
This is the piece that covers the federal side. It pays up to $50,000, equivalent to 100 per cent of the 5 per cent federal part of the HST, and it is administered by the Province of Ontario rather than the CRA.
There is no separate provincial application. You become eligible for it by qualifying for the enhanced rebate on the provincial side, and the rebate application forms include your consent to share your contact, banking and rebate information with Ontario.
3. The federal first-time home buyers' GST/HST rebate
This one is federal, it is only for first-time buyers, and it has been available since agreements signed on or after March 20, 2025. It rebates up to $50,000 of the 5 per cent federal part on homes up to $1 million, phasing down to nothing at $1.5 million. To qualify you need to be at least 18, a Canadian citizen or permanent resident, and you cannot have owned a home you lived in during the current calendar year or any of the four calendar years before it. Neither you nor your spouse or common-law partner can have claimed this rebate before, and you have to be the first person to live in the home.
If you are a first-time buyer inside the enhanced window, you do not stack this on top of the affordability payment. You claim the federal rebate first, and the affordability payment is then reduced by whatever federal rebate you are entitled to. In plain terms, the federal 5 per cent gets covered once, up to $50,000, and the two programs fill in around each other rather than paying twice. Our first-time buyer guide for Ontario covers the rest of the process around it.
What you actually get, by price
The numbers below are maximums, not amounts you receive automatically. Below $1 million you are getting back the tax you actually paid, not a flat cheque. On a $700,000 new build, 13 per cent of the price is roughly $91,000, and that is your relief, not $130,000.
| Price of the new home | Provincial (8% part) | Federal side (5% part) | Combined maximum |
|---|---|---|---|
| Up to $1 million | 100% of the provincial part paid, up to $80,000 | 100% of the federal part paid, up to $50,000 | The full 13% you paid, up to $130,000 |
| Over $1 million to $1.5 million | $80,000 maximum | $50,000 maximum | $130,000 |
| Over $1.5 million to under $1.85 million | Declines in a straight line toward $24,000 | Declines in a straight line toward zero | Falls as the price rises |
| $1.85 million and above | Existing Ontario new housing rebate only, up to $24,000 | Nothing under these programs | Up to $24,000 |
One thing worth watching in a builder contract: the price on the front page and the price the tax is calculated on are often not the same number. Builders frequently quote a price that already assumes you are assigning the rebate to them. Ask for the worksheet that shows both.
If the new build you are considering around Ottawa or Brockville is priced at or under $1 million, none of the phase-out math above applies to you. You are in the full band. The only question that changes your closing is whether the builder credits the money or you front it.
The dates that decide eligibility
These are hard cutoffs, and missing one does not get you a partial rebate. It gets you nothing beyond the old $24,000.
- Agreement of purchase and sale: signed on or after April 1, 2026 and on or before March 31, 2027.
- Construction starts: on or before December 31, 2028.
- Substantially completed: on or before December 31, 2031 for a home you are buying to live in. Owner-built homes and rental units run on a shorter clock, completing before 2030.
- HST payable: no later than December 31, 2032.
- Assignments: both the original agreement and the assignment agreement have to fall inside the April 2026 to March 2027 window.
Two things follow from that list. First, if you signed a builder agreement before April 1, 2026, you are on the old rules, and the enhanced rebate is not available to you. A first-time buyer who signed on or after March 20, 2025 can still claim the federal first-time buyer rebate, but the Ontario enhancement does not reach back.
Second, you cannot cancel an older agreement and sign a fresh one after April 1, 2026 to get inside the window. The rules specifically contemplate this. Where a purchaser terminates an agreement and enters a new one with the same builder or related parties, and the new agreement cannot reasonably be considered to be primarily for real reasons other than obtaining the rebate, it can be treated as though it were the original pre-April agreement. If you are thinking about restructuring a deal, that is a conversation for your lawyer and your accountant before anyone signs anything.
If you are buying it to rent out
The enhanced housing rebate is for homes used as a primary residence. Landlords are not shut out, but they are in a different program: the enhanced new residential rental property rebate, which covers the provincial part up to $80,000 per eligible rental unit for a new home bought from a builder for long-term residential rental, or built for rental. The affordability payment is available on the federal side per eligible rental unit as well, and the same agreement window applies. Rental units have to be substantially completed by December 31, 2029, which is two years tighter than the owner-occupied deadline.
The practical difference matters more than the paperwork difference. A rental rebate is generally not the kind a builder credits on closing. Plan on paying the full tax on closing day and applying for it afterward, and confirm the treatment of your specific deal with your lawyer and accountant well before the closing date arrives.
The part that actually decides your closing day
A rebate you have to claim yourself is money you need in cash on closing day.
If the builder credits the rebate, you pay the net price and the money never leaves your account. If the builder will not credit it, you pay the full HST at closing and apply to the CRA afterward. Builders sometimes refuse to credit it, because if a buyer's occupancy claim does not hold up, the CRA can come back to the builder for the money.
Lenders do not advance mortgage funds against a rebate. On a $1 million build, that gap can be up to $130,000 of your own money, sitting tied up for months. That is not a detail to discover two weeks before closing.
What to ask a builder before you sign
None of this is confrontational. A builder who is set up properly will have clean answers to all of it.
- Is the price in this agreement stated with the rebate already assigned to you, or before the rebate?
- Will you credit the enhanced rebate and the affordability payment to me on closing?
- Can I see your HST worksheet showing exactly what I have to pay on closing day?
- What is your scheduled construction start, and does it sit inside the December 31, 2028 deadline?
- What is your projected completion date, and how much room is there against the completion deadline?
- If the build misses those dates and the rebate is lost, what happens to my agreement and my deposit?
- If I ever needed to assign this agreement, what does that do to the rebate?
The last two are worth putting in writing rather than taking verbally. It is reasonable to make an agreement conditional on your lawyer reviewing it, and this is exactly the kind of thing that review is for.
Where this fits with everything else you are paying
A rebate this size can move a decision, but it is one line in a closing. Land transfer tax, legal fees, adjustments, and the ongoing cost of the home all continue to behave normally. If you are comparing a new build against a resale home, it is worth knowing what your property tax bill is actually based on before you assume the cheaper purchase is the cheaper house.
And a rebate is not a reason to buy something you would not otherwise buy. It is a reason to make sure that if you were buying anyway, the timing and the paperwork are set up so you actually receive it.
Looking at a new build between Brockville and Ottawa?
If you are weighing a builder purchase and want to work through what you would actually bring to closing under these rules, I am happy to go through it with you. No pressure either way.
Reviewed: September 3, 2026. Written from the Canada Revenue Agency Notice 346 on the Ontario enhanced new housing rebate, the CRA first-time home buyers' GST/HST rebate pages, and Ontario's 2026 announcement of the enhanced rebates and the new home affordability payment. Tax rules, thresholds and deadlines change, and how they apply depends on the specific agreement and the specific property. This is general information, not tax or legal advice. Confirm your own eligibility and the exact amounts with your real estate lawyer and your accountant before you rely on any number here.