Do I have to file at home while living in Belgium?
It depends on residence, not on address — except for US citizens and green-card holders, for whom the answer is yes regardless of where they live. We settle the residence question first, because every other answer follows from it.
Is there a treaty between my country and Belgium?
Treaty networks change with each protocol and each multilateral-instrument position, so we confirm the treaty in force for your specific year with the issuing authority rather than relying on a published summary. Where there is none, unilateral relief and domestic law do the work instead.
I own property in Belgium. Where is the rent taxed?
Rent from immovable property is almost always taxable where the property is situated, frequently by withholding on the gross amount, with your home country taxing the same income and giving credit. A net-basis election, where one exists, is usually the difference between tax on profit and tax on turnover.
Does my EU institution salary get taxed in Belgium?
Not necessarily, and the answer does not come from Belgian residence rules. Employment with an international institution can carry its own exemption regime, established by the instrument that created the institution rather than by national tax law, and where it applies it can displace the ordinary charge on that salary. That is why the employer's status is settled before anything else. It does not follow that exempt means invisible: the same salary may still have to be disclosed at home, and it can affect the rate applied to your other income even where it is not itself taxed.
I work for an international organisation in Brussels, do I still file at home?
Very often, yes. An institutional exemption addresses the taxation of the salary in the host country. It says nothing about whether Canada still treats you as resident, or about the citizenship-based filing obligation that follows an American passport. Those questions are answered by your own circumstances: where your home and family are, and which ties you kept. Many people in this position file at home each year with little or no tax to pay, and the filing itself is what keeps the position straight. Stopping because the salary is exempt is how gaps in a filing history begin.
Is my exempt Brussels salary still reportable on my Canadian return?
Treat reporting and taxing as separate questions. An exemption that removes income from the charge in one country does not automatically remove it from a return in another, and under several regimes exempt income still has to be shown so that the rate on the remainder is calculated correctly. The safe order of work is to establish the exact basis of the exemption in writing, from the institution, and then work out what each of your filing obligations does with income of that character. Guessing here is expensive, because the correction is a return amendment rather than a note.
How does Belgium decide whether I am resident?
On where your life actually is, rather than on what your paperwork says. The register entry matters, but the substantive tests look at where you have your home, where your household is, and from where your interests are managed, which is why a spouse and children remaining at home can weigh more heavily than a lease in Brussels. Where both countries reach the same answer, the treaty tie-break decides, working through permanent home, centre of vital interests and habitual abode in that order. Keep the housing, schooling and travel evidence as you go rather than afterwards.
Do I pay Belgian tax on my rental property back home?
If you are resident in Belgium your worldwide income comes into view, and property abroad is not simply ignored. Immovable property is one of the few categories where the treaty usually gives the country in which the property sits the primary right to tax, but the country of residence may still take the income into account in setting the rate on everything else. So the property is taxed where it is and still reported where you live. The figures to have ready are the gross rents and the expenses, on the basis the property's own country accepts.
My spouse stayed in Canada while I moved to Brussels, where am I resident?
This is a common hard case in this corridor, and it is not resolved by counting days alone. A household that stays behind keeps a permanent home available to you and usually keeps the centre of your personal interests there too, while the work and the economic interests move. The tie-break is worked in order, so the analysis can end at the permanent-home stage if a home remains available in only one country, and can run all the way to habitual abode where homes exist in both. Document both households from the start.
I have not filed for several years while living abroad — what are my options?
Both countries have routes back, and using one before they contact you is what preserves the relief. On the US side there are procedures aimed at taxpayers whose failure was not wilful, including one designed for people living outside the country, and separate procedures for late account reports and information returns alone. Canada has its voluntary disclosures programme and taxpayer relief for penalties and interest. Filing quietly and hoping is the one approach with no protection attached to it. See catch-up filing.
What is a foreign tax credit?
A credit against your home-country tax for income tax you already paid to another country on the same income, so the same amount is not taxed twice at full rates. It is capped: you cannot credit more than your home country would have charged on that income, which is why a higher foreign rate leaves an unused balance rather than a refund. In the US it is claimed on Form 1116, in Canada on the T2209 and T2036, in India on Form 67. See Form 1116.
