{"id":15143,"date":"2026-05-20T12:45:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T12:45:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/15143\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T12:45:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T12:45:09","slug":"why-australians-are-calling-new-zealand-a-tax-haven","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/15143\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Australians are calling New Zealand a tax haven"},"content":{"rendered":"

Capital gains taxes have been increased. Where previously investors could have a 50% discount if they owned an asset for at least a year, that is being replaced by a discount based on inflation, and a minimum 30% tax on capital gains \u2013 except for people who are on a pension or other income support or investing in new build housing.<\/p>\n

Assets bought before 1985 that previously were not captured for capital gains tax purposes are also now included.<\/p>\n

Landlords also will not be able to reduce their tax by deducting rental property losses from income earned elsewhere, except for new builds.<\/p>\n

\"AA graph showing the Australia-New Zealand spending gap per person in 2025. Photo \/ Shamubeel Eaqub<\/p>\n

New Zealand does not have a capital gains tax<\/a>, apart from the bright-line test that applies to residential investment property bought and sold within two years.<\/p>\n

Rental property losses are already ringfenced in the investor\u2019s residential property portfolio and cannot be offset against other sources of income.<\/p>\n

Simplicity chief economist Shamubeel Eaqub said Australia had long had more stringent taxes on a wider range of things, including capital gains tax and stamp duty.<\/p>\n

He said the Australian capital gains tax changes were significant, but unlikely to drive people across the Tasman.<\/p>\n

He said what mattered to businesses was whether they could make a profit, then how much of it they could keep.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first part hasn\u2019t really changed, the main reason why people start up a business is because they want to make a successful business and the chances of creating a successful business are much higher in Australia than in New Zealand.\u201d<\/p>\n

People had to make a taxable gain to pay capital gains tax on it. \u201cIt\u2019s not tax on value but tax on gain, so you have to make a profit to pay tax on it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Australia had a broader, more diverse range of taxes, he said, while New Zealand focused more on personal income tax and GST. Australia has a tax-free bracket for lower incomes.<\/p>\n

Australian companies paid more in corporate income tax, and the Australian Government also collected more per capita in payroll tax, stamp duty, royalties, land tax and insurance taxes.<\/p>\n

New Zealanders, on the other hand, paid more in GST, gambling taxes, motor vehicle taxes, rates and customs taxes.<\/p>\n

\"AA graph showing government revenue per capita by type. Photo \/ Shamubeel Eaqub<\/p>\n

New Zealand\u2019s Government spends more as a proportion of gross domestic product, which Eaqub said was due to Australia being better off overall.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not saying it\u2019s a great system, they have their issues like we do but there are big changes taking place … they\u2019ve ripped off the Band-Aid.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kelly Eckhold, chief economist at Westpac, said it was not controversial that New Zealand had a more generous tax treatment for property investment<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cNew Zealand does actually have relatively advantageous rules with respect to that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AA graph showing the Australia-New Zealand spending gap. Photo \/ Shamubeel Eaqub<\/p>\n

Infometrics chief forecaster Gareth Kiernan said it would make sense for Australian investors to eye New Zealand.<\/p>\n

\u201cEspecially given that Australians aren\u2019t restricted under foreign buyer rules, and the sizeable shift in the exchange rate over the last year that makes our property appear that much cheaper.\u201d<\/p>\n

Deloitte tax expert Robyn Walker said New Zealand was \u201cdefinitely not\u201d a tax haven.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat said, after the Australian Budget there has definitely been a bit of a cheeky \u2018tax marketing\u2019 narrative around the tax system being better in New Zealand. I think objectively, the New Zealand tax system is better than Australia. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a simpler approach to a lot of taxes, whereas Australia is very complex and has a number of additional federal and state taxes which we don\u2019t have to deal with in New Zealand. Our lack of a wholesale capital gains tax is a major point of difference.<\/p>\n

\u201cWithout having looked at the detail of their negative gearing rules, conceptually they seem similar to our rules from 2019, albeit they have a new build exemption and we have the ability to opt out of the rules if the disposal of the property will be subject to tax.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cotality chief property economist Kelvin Davidson said it was still possible that New Zealand could move more in Australia\u2019s direction.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt does feel like we are shifting towards tighter property taxes over the medium term … perhaps we are more lenient on the capital gains side of things and Australia is more lenient on the cash flow side.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said he polled investors at a recent event and found that they would rather have a capital gains tax and the ability to fully claim interest costs as a business expense, rather than avoid a capital gains tax but lose interest deductibility.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not surprised by that because what it tells you is that it\u2019s about cash flow … if you can\u2019t service a loan, you can\u2019t keep your property and the capital gains tax is sort of irrelevant because you\u2019re not going to get the capital gain in the first place.\u201d<\/p>\n

– RNZ<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Capital gains taxes have been increased. Where previously investors could have a 50% discount if they owned an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15144,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[15239,22,7458,21,15240,15243,15241,1012,15242,546,15238,13462],"class_list":["post-15143","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-are","tag-au","tag-australians","tag-austrlia","tag-calling","tag-edmunds","tag-haven","tag-new","tag-susan","tag-tax","tag-why","tag-zealand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15143","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15143"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15143\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15144"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15143"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15143"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15143"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}