Victoria Land Tax Calculator

Land tax in Victoria: who pays

Victorian land tax is paid by anyone whose taxable land in Victoria, added together, is worth $50,000 or more at midnight on 31 December ($25,000 for most trusts).

Joint ownership is assessed in layers. The SRO treats each unique combination of owners as a separate joint ownership and assesses it on the land they hold together, and each owner can also receive their own assessment if they own other taxable land.

Land tax calculator VIC: examples at 2026 rates

These figures use the same SRO scales as the calculator above. The low-value rows show the flat COVID debt amounts, which is why a holding of just over the threshold still produces a bill of several hundred dollars. The last column adds the absentee owner surcharge to the general rate.

How the SRO values your land

Land tax is charged on site value: the value of the land alone, without the house, fences or other improvements. On 1 January each year the Valuer-General sets two values for every Victorian property, the site value and the capital improved value.

There is a one-year lag. The 2026 land tax assessments use valuations made on 1 January 2025, just as the 2025 assessments used values from 1 January 2024. If you disagree with the site value, you must object within 2 months of the issue date of your land tax notice; the SRO forwards the objection to the Valuer-General and has no discretion to accept a late one. You still have to pay on time while it is reviewed, and any overpayment is refunded with interest if the value is reduced.

Principal place of residence exemption: what the SRO checks

Your home is exempt from land tax, and the SRO usually applies the exemption from the Notice of Acquisition your conveyancer lodges when you buy. If your conveyancer did not nominate the property as your home, or you move into another property you already own, you must apply yourself through My Land Tax.

• You can generally claim only one principal place of residence exemption anywhere in Australia at a time.
• Land owned by a company or owner corporation is not exempt, even if a shareholder lives there. Discretionary and unit trusts are not exempt either, but the trustee can nominate a beneficiary who lives in the home (form LTX-Trust-19) to get concessional treatment.
• Working from home as an alternative to your employer’s premises does not normally make your home taxable, as long as the employer’s business is run from somewhere else.
• From 1 January 2026, owner-occupied land valued under $300,000 with only a temporary residence such as a caravan, tent or shed can be exempt. You apply in writing.
• If you move out or the ownership changes and you do not tell the SRO, it can issue retrospective assessments for earlier years with penalty tax and interest.

Vacant residential land tax

Vacant residential land tax (VRLT) is a separate annual tax on homes left empty. Since 2025 it applies to residential land across the whole of Victoria; before that it covered only 16 inner and middle-ring Melbourne councils. A property is vacant if nobody lived in it, as a home or under a genuine lease or short-term letting, for more than 6 months of the previous calendar year.

VRLT is charged on the capital improved value (land plus buildings), with no threshold and no COVID levy. The rate rises the longer the property stays liable: 1% in the first year, 2% in the second consecutive year and 3% from the third. On a house with a capital improved value of $900,000, that is $9,000, $18,000, $27,000 respectively, on top of any ordinary land tax. From 1 January 2026 it also reaches metropolitan Melbourne land capable of residential development that has stayed undeveloped for 5 years or more, at 1%.

Owners of vacant residential land must notify the SRO by 15 February, even if they believe an exemption applies. Land that is exempt from land tax is also exempt from VRLT, and there are specific VRLT exemptions for properties that changed ownership in the previous year, land that recently became residential land, land incapable of residential development, undeveloped land next to your home or holiday home and, from 1 January 2026, land with a home under construction, renovation or uninhabitable during the previous year. VRLT assessments are issued before 30 June.

Assessments, instalments and objections

Land tax assessments are generally issued between January and June. You can pay the full amount by the due date or spread it over instalments by setting up a plan in the SRO’s AutoPay portal.

A formal objection must be lodged within 60 days of receiving the assessment and must rest on legal grounds; hardship, personal circumstances or the tax being too high are not valid grounds. Pay the tax in the meantime: interest accrues on unpaid amounts, and a successful objection is refunded with interest.