Stamp Duty NSW: Calculator, Rates & First Home Buyer Concessions (2026)

What is stamp duty in NSW?

Stamp duty, officially called transfer duty in NSW, is the tax you pay the state government when property changes hands. It’s the largest upfront cost of buying after your deposit, and on most Sydney purchases it runs into the tens of thousands.

The buyer pays it, not the seller. It’s calculated on the purchase price (or the property’s market value, whichever is higher) and is normally paid at settlement through your conveyancer or solicitor. It isn’t rolled into your mortgage by default, so you generally need it in cash on top of your deposit. Budgeting for it from the start is the difference between a clean settlement and a scramble.

NSW stamp duty: what you’ll actually pay

Here’s what transfer duty works out to across common NSW price points, for a standard buyer and for an eligible first home buyer.

These are owner-occupier estimates and exclude any foreign buyer surcharge. For an exact figure on your own price, use the full stamp duty calculator.

How NSW stamp duty is calculated

NSW transfer duty is tiered and marginal. The price is split across bands, and each band is charged at its own rate, then the bands are added together. That’s why the effective rate creeps up as the price rises rather than jumping in steps. The brackets below are the ones used by the calculator on this page.

Take a $650,000 home as a worked example. It sits in the $304,000 to $1,013,000 band, so the duty is the $8,897 base plus 4.5% of the $346,000 above $304,000, which is $15,570. Add them and you get $24,467, the figure in the table above.

First home buyers in NSW

This is where NSW is genuinely generous. Under the First Home Buyers Assistance Scheme, an eligible first home buyer pays $0 transfer duty on any home, new or established, up to $800,000. Between $800,001 and $1,000,000 a sliding-scale concession applies, so you pay a reduced amount rather than nothing. Above $1,000,000 standard duty applies with no concession.

Separately, a $10,000 First Home Owner Grant is available on new homes valued up to $750,000. That grant is about cash toward a new build, not duty relief, so the two can stack: an eligible buyer of a new home under $750,000 can claim both the duty exemption and the grant. For the full eligibility rules, grant detail and how to apply, read our NSW first home buyer guide.

Foreign buyers and surcharges

If you’re a foreign person buying residential property in NSW, you pay an extra 8% surcharge purchaser dutyon top of the standard transfer duty. On a $1,000,000 purchase that’s an additional $80,000, separate from the $40,217 standard duty. The surcharge also applies to certain foreign trusts and companies, and the first home buyer concessions are not available to foreign buyers. If residency or visa status is at all unclear in your case, get advice before you exchange.

When do you pay stamp duty in NSW?

Transfer duty in NSW is generally due within about three months of the contract date, and in practice it’s paid at settlement. Your conveyancer or solicitor usually arranges the payment as part of the settlement process, so the funds are accounted for on the day rather than left for you to handle afterwards.

Pay late and interest can be charged, which is another reason the timing sits with your conveyancer. If you’re unsure how it’s handled in your transaction, our conveyancing guide explains who does what at settlement.