Mayor Rob Ford says he hopes to cut the land transfer tax by 10 per cent in the city’s upcoming budget and eventually eliminate it altogether.
Ford made the comment to CP24 Thursday afternoon ahead of a high school football game featuring his Don Bosco Secondary School Eagles.
The tax, first introduced by David Miller in 2008, pumps about $204 million into city coffers annually, however eliminating it was a major plank of Ford’s election campaign.
“We are going to try to get rid of it,” Ford said Thursday. “It’s a challenge; there is no doubt about it, but hopefully we can take 10 per cent this year and 10 per cent next year and just nibble away at it.”
Ford has promised to eliminate the land transfer tax in installments before.
In fact last December he told CP24 that the tax would be reduced in 2012 and completely eliminated by 2015, however the tax has not yet been reduced and a 2015 deadline to eliminate it seems unlikely.
"I campaigned I would abolish it by the end of my term and I am sticking to my promise," Ford said at the time. "I can't say we will wipe it all out this year, but we are going to do it piece by piece and you will see a portion of the land transfer tax gone by next year."
The land transfer tax is added onto the cost of all real estate purchases and is levied in addition to a provincial land transfer tax.
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