Principal private residence relief: no CGT on your home

If the home you are selling was your home for the whole time you owned it, you pay no capital gains tax. That is principal private residence relief, or PPR relief. The rule has edges: time away, letting, a big garden, a second home. This guide explains the full relief, the partial relief, and each edge, with a worked example.

The rule in one line

Capital gains tax (CGT) is a tax on the profit when you sell something. PPR relief removes the tax on the gain from your home for the time it was your only or main home. "Principal private residence" just means your main home.

The rate of CGT is 33%. Budget 2027 announced a rate of 31% for sales with a contract dated 7 October 2026 or later. The change is not law until the Finance Act 2026 passes, so every figure at 31% is marked announced. See the rule change tracker.

Full relief

You get full relief, and pay nothing, when all of these are true.

• The home was your only or main home for the whole time you owned it, apart from the gaps the rules allow.
• The grounds are one acre or less, including the site of the house.
• You did not buy it mainly to sell at a profit.
• You did not use part of it only for business.

You still have to file a CGT return for the year of sale, even with full relief and no tax due. The return is due by 31 October the following year.

Partial relief

Where the home was your main home for only part of the time, the gain is split by days. Count the days it was your main home. Add the last twelve months of ownership. Divide by the total days you owned it. That fraction of the gain is relieved. The rest is taxed.

Here is the worked example the calculator is tested against. A home bought on 15 January 2015 for €250,000 with €6,000 of buying costs. The owner lived there until 31 December 2019, then let it. Sold with a contract dated 20 November 2026 for €480,000, with €12,000 of selling costs.

The capital gains tax calculator does the day count from your own dates. The guide on capital gains tax when selling covers the costs you can take off and the dates to pay.

The last twelve months always count

The final twelve months of ownership count as if you lived there, whatever you were doing. This covers the usual gap between moving into a new home and selling the old one. It also means that if you lived in a home for years and let it for the last year, you still get full relief.

Time away that still counts

Some absences are treated as if you were living in the home. These are called periods of deemed occupation. The rules allow:

• Any period working abroad, where you lived in the home before you left and again after you came back.
• Up to four years in total of absence because your job in Ireland required you to live elsewhere, again with occupation before and after.
• Time in a nursing home or in care, where you left for health reasons.

Time away for other reasons, such as travelling, moving in with a partner, or living in a second home, does not count. Nor does an absence where you never moved back in afterwards, except for the last twelve months.

Letting out a room, or part of the home

Taking a lodger under the rent-a-room scheme, where you live in the home too, does not reduce the relief. Letting the whole home while you live elsewhere does, for the days it was let.

Letting a self-contained part, such as a granny flat or a converted garage with its own door, is different. That part is treated as not your home for the time it was let, and the gain on it is taxed. The split is by floor area and by days.

Using part of the home for work

Working from a desk in the kitchen changes nothing. Using a room only for business, such as a surgery, a shop or an office that is never used as living space, takes that room out of the relief. The gain on that part is taxed. If the room is used for both, the relief usually stands.

The one-acre rule

The relief covers the house and grounds of up to one acre, which is about 4,047 square metres, including the site of the house. If the grounds are bigger, the gain on the part over one acre is taxed, unless the extra land is needed for the enjoyment of the house. A bigger garden in a town can be argued; a field let to a farmer cannot.

Selling a site from the garden, while you keep the house, is also taxed in most cases. The relief can cover the site if the sale does not reduce the grounds below what the house needs. Ask a tax adviser before you agree a site sale.

Two homes

You can only have one main home at a time, and a married couple or civil partners share one. If you own two, you can write to Revenue within two years of the second one starting and say which is your main home. If you do not, Revenue decides on the facts: where you live, where your post goes, where your family is.

A home bought to sell

If Revenue decides you bought a home mainly to sell it at a profit, the relief does not apply. The usual signs are a short time of ownership, a resale soon after works, and a pattern of doing it more than once. Living in a home for years and then selling is not that.

Separation and divorce

When a couple separates and one leaves, the one who moved out can lose relief on their share for the days after leaving, except for the last twelve months. A transfer between spouses under a court order on separation or divorce is generally free of CGT. The guide on selling the family home after separation covers it, and a solicitor on the Law Society's register can advise on the order.

Inherited homes

An inherited home is valued at the date of death for CGT, so the gain is only the rise since then. If you lived in it as your main home after inheriting, the relief covers those days. If you did not, there is no relief, but the gain is often small. The guide on selling an inherited house explains it.

What to keep

Keep the dates you moved in and out, the letting agreements, the planning and invoices for any extension, and the buying and selling costs. Revenue can ask for them years after the sale. A diary of dates is enough for the day count.

Where this leaves you

Put your dates into the capital gains tax calculator and it will do the day count, apply the last twelve months, and show the tax at both rates. The selling journey lists the other steps. Where the answer is not clear, ask a tax adviser before contracts are signed.