Personal Tax Filing and Planning in Burnaby, Richmond and Coquitlam
A return with one T4 on it is a form. A return with dividends, a rental property, a capital gain, and a foreign account on it is a set of decisions.
What this covers
Personal income tax work covers the T1 return and the planning around it: instalments, registered plan timing, capital gains and property reporting, foreign asset disclosure, and the interaction between what you take out of a corporation and what you pay personally. For an owner-manager the personal and corporate returns are one decision reported on two forms. We prepare and file these returns for clients in Burnaby, Richmond, Coquitlam and across Metro Vancouver.
Who this is for
- Owner-managers whose personal return depends on corporate decisions
- Professionals and executives with income from several sources
- Individuals with rental property, a second property, or foreign holdings
- Executors filing a final return for someone who has died
What you end up with
The point of the exercise
A return that agrees with the company
Personal and corporate filings prepared together, so dividends, salary, and loan balances reconcile.
No interest for the avoidable reasons
Instalments set correctly and the April 30 payment date respected even where June 15 filing applies.
Someone to call about the letter
CRA review requests and adjustments handled directly rather than landing on your desk.
Personal Income Taxes in detail
Deadlines, and the one everybody gets wrong
Returns are due April 30, or June 15 if you or your spouse carried on a business, but the balance owing is due April 30 either way and interest runs from May 1. Quarterly instalments start once net tax owing passes $3,000 in this year and one of the two before, which catches owners the year they switch from salary to dividends.
Property and foreign holdings
A home sale has to be reported to claim the principal residence exemption, even when the gain is fully exempt; rental use, a change in use or a second property changes the arithmetic. Foreign property that cost more than $100,000 in total requires Form T1135, which carries some of the harshest late-filing penalties in the Act.
The corporate connection
An owner's personal return is downstream of decisions made in the company: how much salary was paid, which dividend pool the distributions came from, whether the shareholder loan was cleared, and whether the split income rules apply. Preparing both returns with one view of the picture is the only way the numbers reconcile.
Alternative minimum tax, and other surprises
The minimum tax, revised in 2024, bites in a year with a large capital gain, heavy use of the capital gains exemption or large donations of appreciated securities. It can be recovered over seven years, but the cash goes out first. Stock options, a capital gains reserve, departure tax and a deceased's final return all need attention before filing season, not during it.
How it runs
What working together looks like
Plan before December 31
Most of what can be changed has to be changed before year-end — loss selling, donation timing, instalment top-ups, and the remuneration mix.
Assemble once, properly
A single checklist covering slips, dispositions, foreign holdings, and the corporate amounts, so the return is not rebuilt three times.
Reconcile against the corporation
Dividends, salary, and shareholder loan movements are matched to the corporate records before the personal return is filed.
File and confirm
Return filed, instalment schedule set for the coming year, and the notice of assessment reviewed against what was filed.
Handle correspondence
Review requests, adjustments, and objections dealt with on your behalf, so a routine CRA letter does not become a project.
Questions
Personal Income Taxes, answered
General information about how the rules work, current at the time of writing — not advice about your situation. Speak to Ray Loucks before acting on any of it.
When is my personal tax return due if I'm self-employed?
The filing deadline is June 15, but any balance owing is still due April 30 and interest accrues from May 1. The extension applies to the return, not the payment. If you expect to owe, the practical deadline is April 30 regardless of when you intend to file.
Do I have to report the sale of my home?
Yes. Even where the principal residence exemption eliminates the entire gain, the disposition must be reported on the return and the property designated. Failing to report can attract penalties and can extend the period during which the CRA may reassess. Where the property was not your principal residence for every year you owned it, part of the gain is taxable and the calculation apportions it across the designated years.
When do I have to pay tax instalments?
When your net tax owing exceeds $3,000 in the current year and in either of the two preceding years. Instalments are due March 15, June 15, September 15, and December 15. The CRA sends reminders based on prior-year figures, but the obligation is yours whether or not a reminder arrives — and the common trigger is a shift from salary, where tax is withheld at source, to dividends, where it is not.
What is the alternative minimum tax, and who does it hit?
It is a parallel tax calculation that disallows or limits certain deductions and credits and charges the higher of the two results. Following the changes effective in 2024, it most often affects individuals in a year with a large capital gain, a significant claim of the lifetime capital gains exemption, or substantial donations of appreciated securities. Amounts paid can generally be carried forward and recovered against regular tax over the next seven years, so it is frequently a timing cost rather than a permanent one — but it is still cash out the door in the year it applies.
Do I need to report my foreign investments?
If the total cost of your specified foreign property exceeded $100,000 at any time during the year, Form T1135 is required with your return. The test is cost rather than market value, and it aggregates across holdings. Property in registered plans and personal-use property such as a vacation home you do not rent are excluded. The late-filing penalties are severe and apply per year, so a missed filing is worth addressing promptly.
Read moreOften needed together