The Canada Revenue Agency’s crackdown on tax fraud in the overheated real estate markets of Ontario and British Columbia is bearing fruit, with auditors recovering $240-million in unpaid taxes and $12.5-million in additional penalties over the past 18 months, new figures show.
The money is being recovered as auditors focus on several issues identified in a series of stories in The Globe and Mail, including property flipping, efforts to hide capital gains and avoid paying sales taxes, and false ownership statements.
Still, the new figures show the CRA has a lot of catching up to do in British Columbia, where the federal agency doubled its auditing effort last year in response to widespread concerns over fraud and rising real estate prices.
