What is included in the fee for departure (emigration) return?
The departure-year return with the deemed disposition computed, the property listing filed, and any election to defer payment against security prepared alongside.
What would make departure (emigration) return cost more than the standard tier?
Private holdings. A listed portfolio values itself; private company shares, foreign real estate and crypto need defensible valuations as at the departure day.
Is the fee really fixed?
Yes, for the scope quoted. If the scope changes — another year appears, an entity turns up, a certificate becomes necessary — we re-quote before doing the work, so there is never an invoice you have not already agreed to.
Do I still have to file a Canadian return for the year I left?
Yes, and it is not an ordinary return. The departure year is filed as a part-year resident return that reports worldwide income up to the date residence ceased and Canadian-source income after it. It also carries the deemed disposition, which treats most property as though it had been sold on the departure date. The departure date itself is a question of fact, settled from ties given up and ties kept, and it needs to be settled before the return can be prepared, because it fixes both the split of income and the valuation date for the property.
What is departure tax and what does it apply to?
Departure tax is not a separate tax. It is ordinary tax on a gain the law treats as having been realised on the day you stopped being resident, because that is the last moment the gain is within reach. Property is deemed disposed of at its value on that date and reacquired at the same value, so the accrued gain to the departure date is taxed then and the later real sale is measured from the new cost. Some categories are excluded from the deeming, which is why the property listing matters as much as the arithmetic.
Do I have to sell my house and investments when I leave Canada?
No. The deemed disposition is a tax fiction, not an instruction to sell. Nothing changes hands, no broker is involved and you can keep every asset. What changes is the measuring point: the property is treated as sold at its departure-date value and reacquired at that same value, so the gain that accrued while you were resident is brought to tax in the departure year and the rest is left to the country you have moved to. The practical work is evidencing those departure-date values, one asset at a time.
Can I delay paying departure tax until I actually sell the property?
There is an election that lets the payment be deferred rather than the tax cancelled, and it is granted against security acceptable to the authority. It is not automatic. It is applied for, it has to be filed with the departure-year return rather than mentioned afterwards, and the security has to be arranged. We prepare the election alongside the return where the amounts make it worth doing, and we tell you before the engagement starts whether your facts are likely to support one, so the choice is made with the figures in front of you rather than after the filing.
I left Canada two years ago and never filed a departure return. What happens?
The departure year does not close on its own, and the longer it sits the harder the valuations become, because departure-date values have to be evidenced from records that get no easier to obtain. The work is the same in shape: settle the departure date, list the property, value it at that date, prepare the return for the correct year and file it. Late departure returns are scoped as their own engagement because of the evidence-gathering, and the fixed fee is agreed in writing once we have seen what records survive.
Why does a departure return cost more than an ordinary return?
Because three pieces of work sit on top of the return itself. The departure date has to be determined and supported rather than assumed. Every affected property has to be listed and valued at that date, which for private company shares or foreign holdings is the bulk of the engagement. And any election to defer payment has to be prepared and filed with the return, not after it. A return with a short, liquid asset list stays at the standard tier; one with unlisted holdings or a second country involved moves up, and you are told which before work begins.
Is there an exit tax when a green card holder leaves the United States?
Only for long-term residents — those who held the green card for long enough to be inside the expatriation regime — and then only if one of the covered expatriate tests is met. The step people skip is the formal one: the status has to be properly ended for tax purposes, and until it is, worldwide filing continues no matter where you live. Abandoning the card and forgetting the tax filing is the common, expensive sequence. See giving up a green card.
What is the US exit tax?
A charge that applies when a US citizen renounces or a long-term permanent resident gives up their status and meets one of the covered-expatriate tests — an income test, a net-worth test, or a failure to certify five years of compliance. A covered expatriate is treated as having sold worldwide assets on the day before expatriation, and Form 8854 is what reports the position. The tests turn on figures that are indexed, so they are read for the year of expatriation. See Form 8854.
