Newcomers to B.C. sue over Foreign Buyers' Tax after purchasing Kelowna home

A couple who recently moved to Canada went to court after realizing they'd have to pay the Foreign Buyers' Tax on the home they'd purchased in B.C.'s Southern Interior.

A couple who recently moved to Canada went to court after realizing they'd have to pay the Foreign Buyers' Tax on the home they'd purchased in B.C.'s Southern Interior.

The judge’s decision, which was published online earlier this week, said the couple immigrated to Canada four years ago, and settled in Kelowna.

The plaintiffs moved to B.C. from the U.K. for work. Robert Edward Shave was hired as an instructor at the University of British Columbia, Okanagan.

Once in the area, they started to look for a home, and hired a real estate agent and lawyer to aid in their purchase. They found a home they liked in June 2018, and agreed to buy it for $862,000.

What they claim they didn't know is that B.C.'s recently-expanded Foreign Buyers' Tax would apply, and they'd be expected to pay another $172,400. With interest, that amount reached $182,813.12 by July.

Shave and his partner, Kelly Jane Ashford, say they found out when they got a notice of assessment from the province stating the tax was still owed. No one had told them before that, they told the court.

Their timing was interesting. Had they bought a house in the area before February of that year, they would not have had to pay. When B.C. introduced the tax, it was initially just in the Metro Vancouver area. But it was expanded shortly after Shave and Ashford immigrated, and before they bought the house.