Real estate transfer tax for buyers in Croatia

Here you will find a brief overview of real estate transfer tax for property buyers in Croatia.

How much is the real estate transfer tax when buying a property in Croatia? Who pays for this? Whom? When?

When buying real estate, you become liable for real estate transfer tax. If the seller is a legal entity in the VAT system, i.e. the purchase price includes VAT, then there is no obligation to pay real estate transfer tax.

In our ads, we always try to highlight if the property for sale is exempt from real estate transfer tax.

The real estate transfer tax in Croatia is 3% of the market value of the property.

The notary public forwards every concluded purchase contract to the Tax Authority. The Tax Authority decides on the real estate transfer tax based on the purchase contract and the stated purchase price compared to the market value of the property. The notice will be delivered to the buyer’s home address. The tax office now sends these tax notices in a very short time. The tax is transferred to the account of the municipality in which the property was purchased. The payment deadline is 15 days from receipt of the notice.

When paying real estate transfer tax, it is very important to enter the reference numbers correctly so that the payment is recorded properly. When making payment from abroad, we recommend contacting the municipality or Tax Authority office to check whether everything has been properly recorded so that no penalty interest accrue unnecessarily.