Toronto's 2024 Vacant Home Tax Bill: Three Instalments Due This Fall, and What Property-Owning Businesses Should Budget

Toronto's Vacant Home Tax (VHT) bill for the 2024 taxation year — the tax assessed on residential properties declared, or deemed, vacant during 2024 — falls due this fall in three equal instalments: September 15, October 15, and November 17, 2025. For most homeowners the tax is a one-line annual concern. For Toronto business owners, incorporated professionals, and investors who hold residential property through a corporation, an estate, or a numbered company — a second home used partly for client hosting, a property held for a relocating employee, an investment unit between tenants — the VHT is a real, budgetable cost that's easy to miss if it isn't tied into the same calendar as the rest of the business's tax planning. This is what the fall 2025 instalment schedule means and how to budget around it.

The instalment dates and the rate

Toronto's Vacant Home Tax applies to residential properties in the city that were not the principal residence of the owner or a permitted occupant, and were not otherwise exempt, for more than six months of the taxation year. Payments for the 2024 taxation year are due in three equal instalments on September 15, October 15, and November 17, 2025.

Source: City of Toronto — Vacant Home Tax.

Beginning with the 2024 taxation year, the VHT rate is 3% of the property's Current Value Assessment (CVA) — up from 1% for the 2022 and 2023 taxation years. On a property assessed at $1,000,000, that's a $30,000 annual tax if the property is subject to VHT for the full year, a figure large enough that it changes the economics of holding a vacant or underused Toronto residential property, business-owned or not.

Source: City of Toronto — Vacant Home Tax.

Why this matters to a business, not just a homeowner

The VHT is framed around "homes," but the tax applies based on the property's use and occupancy status during the taxation year, not on who owns it. A Toronto business or its principal can be on the hook for VHT in situations that don't look like a typical vacant home:

• A residential property held in a corporate name — for a relocating employee, a future office conversion, an investment, or as part of an estate or succession plan — that sat vacant or under-occupied for more than six months in 2024.
• A property between tenants for an extended period during 2024, where the gap between leases stretched past the six-month exemption window without the owner realizing the clock had started.
• A property under renovation for most of 2024 without the specific renovation exemption having been properly claimed and documented — VHT has narrow, documented exemptions, not a blanket allowance for "the property wasn't liveable."

If a declaration wasn't filed for the 2024 taxation year — declarations were due earlier in 2025 — the property is deemed vacant by default and taxed accordingly, with the VHT forming a lien against the property itself. That default-to-taxable structure is exactly why a business holding Toronto residential property should treat the VHT declaration as a fixed annual compliance task, not a discretionary form.

Budgeting the three instalments

Unlike an annual property tax bill that a business might fold into a single year-end accrual, the VHT's three fall instalments land inside a five-week window in the same quarter as other year-end business obligations — corporate tax instalments, Q4 payroll planning, and holiday-season cash-flow demands for many Toronto businesses. Treating the three VHT payments as a single lump adjustment in September, rather than three separate dates, reduces the chance of a missed instalment triggering interest.

Late payment is not a minor penalty

Toronto charges interest on overdue Vacant Home Tax at 1.25% on the first day of default and on the first day of each month thereafter, for as long as the balance remains unpaid. Combined with the underlying 3% rate, a missed instalment compounds quickly relative to a typical municipal property tax late fee, and the unpaid tax forms a lien on the property regardless of who currently occupies it.

Source: City of Toronto — Vacant Home Tax.

What Toronto-area business owners should do

• Confirm whether a 2024 VHT declaration was filed for any residential property held personally, through a corporation, or through an estate or trust connected to the business — if it wasn't, the property may already be assessed as vacant by default.
• Set aside the three fall instalment amounts now, rather than treating September 15 as a surprise; the November 17 date in particular can be easy to lose track of once Q4 operational priorities take over.
• Review any property that sat vacant, between tenants, or under renovation for an extended period in 2024 against the specific documented exemptions, rather than assuming an informal explanation will suffice if the City reviews the file.
• Coordinate the VHT instalment schedule with the rest of Q4 tax and cash-flow planning — it lands in the same weeks as many corporate instalment and payroll obligations, and budgeting them together avoids a late-fall cash squeeze.
• Build VHT into next year's planning for any property still vacant or underused through 2025, since the 3% rate and the declaration requirement repeat annually, not just for the 2024 taxation year.

The bigger picture

The Vacant Home Tax is a municipal, property-specific tax, not a business tax in the way corporate income tax or the EHT are — but for a Toronto business or its principals holding residential property in any capacity, it behaves like one: a real annual liability with fixed dates, real interest for lateness, and a default rule that assumes the worst if a declaration is missed. Folding the fall instalment dates into the same calendar as year-end business tax planning is a small step that avoids a real cost.

Key takeaways

• Toronto's 2024 Vacant Home Tax is due in three equal instalments on September 15, October 15, and November 17, 2025.
• The VHT rate for the 2024 taxation year is 3% of Current Value Assessment, up from 1% in 2022–2023.
• Properties held through a corporation, estate, or held between tenants or under renovation can be subject to VHT the same as an individually owned home if a declaration wasn't filed or an exemption wasn't properly documented.
• No declaration means the property is deemed vacant by default and taxed accordingly, with the tax forming a lien on the property.
• Late VHT instalments accrue interest at 1.25% per month from the first day of default.

If your business holds Toronto residential property and you want the Vacant Home Tax folded into your Q4 cash-flow and tax-instalment planning rather than handled as a separate surprise, RN Canada works with Toronto-area owners remotely from our Edmonton and Vancouver offices. Explore our bookkeeping and tax filing services or our Toronto and Ontario pages for more on how we support GTA clients.