Landlords get more time as registration forms roll out March 1

Land­lords across Trinidad and To­ba­go will soon be re­quired to for­mal­ly step in­to the tax net, as down­load­able reg­is­tra­tion forms for the new Land­lord Busi­ness Sur­charge be­come avail­able from March 1, 2026.

The Board of In­land Rev­enue (BIR) an­nounced this week that prepa­ra­tions are well ad­vanced to fa­cil­i­tate com­pli­ance ahead of the roll­out of the new tax mea­sure, in­tro­duced in the 2025/2026 Na­tion­al Bud­get. Fi­nance Min­is­ter Dav­en­dranath Tan­coo met with se­nior BIR of­fi­cials to re­view readi­ness for im­ple­men­ta­tion and ease the tran­si­tion for land­lords.

Un­der the new re­quire­ments, all land­lords must reg­is­ter their rental prop­er­ties with the BIR. The reg­is­tra­tion dead­line has been ex­tend­ed to May 30, from an ear­li­er cut-off of March 31, to al­low land­lords ad­di­tion­al time to reg­u­larise their af­fairs.

Min­is­ter Tan­coo said the ex­ten­sion was de­lib­er­ate. “This en­sures land­lords have suf­fi­cient time to get their house in or­der and re­duces the po­ten­tial for rushed reg­is­tra­tion clos­er to the dead­line,” he said.

Fail­ure to reg­is­ter and file will at­tract penal­ties. In­di­vid­u­als face fines of $1,000 for every six months they are late, while cor­po­ra­tions or lim­it­ed li­a­bil­i­ty com­pa­nies will be fined $2,500 for every six-month pe­ri­od of non-com­pli­ance. More se­ri­ous sanc­tions al­so ap­ply, in­clud­ing fines of up to $250,000 and pos­si­ble im­pris­on­ment for up to three years.

The Land­lord Busi­ness Sur­charge ap­plies to gross rental in­come, with no de­duc­tions al­lowed. Rental in­come un­der $20,000 at­tracts a 2.5 per cent sur­charge, while in­come above $20,000 is charged at 3.5 per cent. A one-time reg­is­tra­tion fee of $2,500 is al­so re­quired.

Min­is­ter Tan­coo stressed that the sur­charge is not a dou­ble tax. “The sur­charge is min­i­mal and is cred­itable to­ward your fi­nal an­nu­al tax li­a­bil­i­ty,” he said, urg­ing land­lords to com­ply ear­ly and avoid penal­ties.

The Gov­ern­ment has said the mea­sure is aimed at im­prov­ing trans­paren­cy and com­pli­ance in the rental mar­ket, with im­pli­ca­tions for both land­lords and ten­ants as en­force­ment ramps up in the com­ing months.