In short
- 20% on the gain from property in Cyprus and from shares of companies that hold it.
- From 2026 indirect holdings count when 20% of the shares' value comes from Cyprus property.
- Lifetime exemptions for a person from 2026: €30,000, €50,000 for a farmer, €150,000 for a main home.
- Declare on form T.D.401 or T.D.402 within one month of the disposal and pay with the declaration.
In this guide
What Cyprus capital gains tax is charged on: property, shares and the 20% rate
Capital gains tax is a separate tax of 20% on the gain from disposing of property. The Capital Gains Tax Law gives the word property four meanings, and the reform in force since 1 January 2026 widened the third.
- Immovable property in Cyprus: land, a house, a flat, an office.
- Shares of a company that owns immovable property in Cyprus, whatever part of the company's value the property makes up.
- Shares of a company that holds such property through other companies, where 20% or more of the market value of the shares comes from it. Until 31 December 2025 the line stood at 50%.
- A contract to buy property in Cyprus, when the buyer passes the rights under it to someone else.
A disposal is wider than a sale. It includes a sale agreement, an exchange, a gift, a lease registered at the Land Registry, an option to buy and money received for cancelling a sale.
The tax follows the property. It is due whatever the tax residence of the seller, a person or a company, and property outside Cyprus is outside it.
A seller who trades in property pays income tax or corporate tax on the profit, and no capital gains tax. The Tax Department decides who trades by ten criteria, among them how long the property was held and how often the seller makes such sales.
Before a company sells a property or a subsidiary, we work out the tax on the sale as part of Cyprus tax services.
What is outside the tax: shares in general, securities and other titles
The Income Tax Law exempts profit from the disposal of titles, and capital gains tax reaches a title only where Cyprus property stands behind it. Titles are shares, bonds, debentures, founders' shares and other titles of companies or other legal persons, formed in Cyprus or abroad, and rights on them. The exemption asks for no minimum holding and no holding period.
| What is disposed of | Capital gains tax |
|---|---|
| Shares of a company with no property in Cyprus | None |
| Bonds, debentures and other securities | None |
| Shares of a company that holds Cyprus property, listed on a regulated market of a recognised stock exchange | None |
| The same shares, listed on a market that is not regulated | None while the value of your disposals in the calendar year stays within €50,000 |
| Property outside Cyprus | None |
Once disposals of such shares on a non-regulated market pass €50,000 in a year, each disposal of that year is taxed. Shares held on 31 December 2025 and listed on such a market on that day keep the exemption at any amount. From 1 January 2031 the redemption of units in an investment fund stops counting as a disposal of titles. The gain on a fund set up as a company then counts as a dividend.
How the gain is calculated: indexation, costs and a worked example
- Start from the price the parties declare. Between connected persons the market value replaces a lower declared price.
- Take off the cost: the purchase price, with what was spent on building, additions and improvements. For property owned since before 1 January 1980 the cost is its value on that date.
- Raise each of these amounts by inflation. Multiply it by the index of the month before the sale and divide by the index of the month of purchase, or of the month the works ended. Both come from the Tax Department's table of inflation values.
- Take off the costs of the transaction as they stand. These are transfer fees, valuation, advertising and legal fees, the commission of a registered estate agent and the interest on the loan for the purchase.
- Set off a loss from an earlier disposal. A loss has no time limit: it carries forward until later gains absorb it.
- An individual then takes off what remains of the lifetime exemption. The rest is taxed at 20%.
Each amount needs its paper: the title deed or purchase contract, invoices and receipts for the works, the loan agreement with a yearly statement of interest, the agent's tax invoice.
Capital gains tax example: a flat bought in 2010 and sold in 2026
A person bought a holiday flat in June 2010 for €180,000 and sells it in October 2026 for €300,000. The index of June 2010 is 216.83. The index of September 2026, the month before the sale, is 269.17. She has never used a lifetime exemption.
| Step | Amount |
|---|---|
| Sale price | €300,000 |
| Indexed cost: €180,000 times 269.17, divided by 216.83 | €223,449.71 |
| Transfer fees paid at the purchase | €7,600 |
| Estate agent's commission and legal fees | €11,000 |
| Gain | €57,950.29 |
| Lifetime exemption | €30,000 |
| Taxable gain | €27,950.29 |
| Capital gains tax at 20% | €5,590.06 |
Inflation covers €43,449.71 of the €120,000 between the two prices, and the law leaves that part untaxed.
Capital gains tax exemptions in Cyprus: lifetime amounts and exempt transfers
An individual has three exemptions, each used once in a lifetime. A company has none. The amounts rose on 1 January 2026.
| Lifetime exemption | Disposal from 1 January 2026 | Disposal until 31 December 2025 |
|---|---|---|
| Any property | €30,000 | €17,086 |
| Farm land sold by a farmer | €50,000 | €25,629 |
| Main home | €150,000 | €85,430 |
| The three together, at most | €150,000 | €85,430 |
The home exemption has three conditions. The owner lived in the home for 5 years in all, or 10 years where it is the second home sold or a later one. The home stands on land of up to 1,500 square metres. And the sale comes within a year of the owner moving out. Co-owners share the amount by their parts.
What is left of an exemption passes to the next disposal. A person who used the whole €17,086 before 2026 has €12,914 more from 2026. A person who used €30,000 on a plot has €120,000 left for the home.
Transfers that are exempt at any amount
- A transfer on death.
- A gift between spouses, from a parent to a child or between relatives up to the third degree.
- A gift to a family company whose shareholders remain members of the family for 5 years.
- A gift to an approved charity, to the Republic or to a local authority.
- An exchange of properties of equal value, and land handed to a developer in return for units finished within 5 years.
- Expropriation, a company reorganisation and a transfer between former spouses.
- Land or a building bought at market value from an unrelated seller between 16 July 2015 and 31 December 2016, whenever it is sold.
A gift or an inheritance moves the gain to the next owner. When that owner sells, the cost is what the giver or the deceased paid.
We do this for you Cyprus corporate tax services from €290 a month with accounting
Who files, with which form, and when the tax is paid
The person or company that disposes of the property files the declaration and pays the tax it has calculated, resident or not. The month runs from the sale agreement, which the law counts as a disposal.
| What | Form or amount | When |
|---|---|---|
| Sale of immovable property | Declaration T.D.401 with questionnaire T.D.413 | Within one month of the disposal, and before the transfer |
| Sale of shares | Declaration T.D.402 | Within one month of the disposal |
| Payment | The tax as the seller calculates it | With the declaration |
| Interest | 3.5% a year in 2026 | From one month after the disposal |
| Late declaration | €250 for a person, €1,000 for a company | After the month |
| Late payment | 5% of the tax, and 5% more after 2 months | After the due date |
The forms go by hand to the district office of the Tax Department, with the sale agreement and the papers for each cost. The tax is paid in the Tax Portal by card or internet banking. The Department can raise a further assessment within 3 months of the payment, and it can question a declared price for 6 months.
For a property that was let, the office also asks for a statement of the rents of each year. Rent that was never declared is put right first, back to the start of the letting or over the last 12 years.
Capital gains of a company and of a person: what differs
| Point | Person | Company |
|---|---|---|
| Rate | 20% | 20% |
| Lifetime exemptions | €30,000, €50,000 or €150,000 | None |
| Transfers with no tax | Gifts to a spouse, a child or a relative up to the third degree | A reorganisation, and set cases between a family company and its shareholders |
| A seller who trades in property | Income tax by the bands, up to 35% | Corporate tax at 15% |
| Late declaration | €250 | €1,000 |
A capital gain is taxed once. The law defines it as a gain that is not profit under the Income Tax Law, so a company's gain on an investment property stays out of its corporate tax computation. The guide to the Cyprus corporate tax rate shows where the two taxes meet.
A founder who buys an office or a flat through a company gives up the personal exemptions on a later sale. The company itself is formed like any other: company formation in Cyprus.
Crypto-assets: 8% under the Income Tax Law, outside capital gains tax
The Capital Gains Tax Law does not cover crypto-assets. The Income Tax Law has taxed them since 1 January 2026: profit from the disposal of crypto-assets bears a flat 8%, for a person and for a company.
- A disposal is a sale, a gift, an exchange of one crypto-asset for another or a payment made with one.
- A loss is set off against crypto gains of the same tax year. It does not carry forward and does not pass to another company of the group.
- Crypto-assets obtained by mining are outside the 8% rule, and profit outside the rule is taxed by the general rules of the law.
- Crypto-asset has the meaning of Regulation (EU) 2023/1114.
Under income tax in Cyprus a person pays the same 8% on profit from crypto-assets. We compute these taxes for a company and for its owner: tax services in Cyprus.
