Main Residence CGT Exemption Calculator
Estimate the CGT on your home sale — including full exemption, partial exemption, and the tax saving from the main residence concession.
How the Main Residence CGT Exemption Works
When you sell a property that has been your main residence — your home — for the entire time you owned it, the capital gain is completely exempt from CGT. This is one of the most generous exemptions in the Australian tax system and can save hundreds of thousands of dollars in tax on a property that has significantly appreciated.
Full Exemption
To qualify for a full exemption, the property must have been your main residence for the entire ownership period, must have land of 2 hectares or less, and must never have been used to produce income (such as renting it out or running a business from a dedicated area).
Partial Exemption
If the property was your main residence for only part of the time you owned it — for example, you rented it out for several years — only a proportional part of the gain is exempt. The formula is:
Exempt portion = Years as main residence ÷ Total years owned
The taxable portion of the gain also qualifies for the 50% CGT discount (assuming held over 12 months), which this calculator applies automatically.
The 6-Year Absence Rule
If you move out of your main residence and rent it to tenants, you can still treat it as your main residence for up to 6 years under the 6-year absence rule. During this period, you do not lose the CGT exemption. If you move back in before the 6 years is up, the clock resets. You can include this absence period in your "years as main residence" for this calculator.
6-Month Overlap
When you buy a new home before selling the old one, you can treat both properties as your main residence for up to 6 months. This prevents a CGT issue during the brief overlap period. Note: this calculator does not model the overlap automatically — use the years as main residence field to account for it.