Regime jovem: the IMT and stamp duty exemption's three traps

A €300,000 home costs someone over 35 €12,942.04 in IMT (property transfer tax) and Imposto do Selo (stamp duty). For someone aged 35 or under — who meets a handful of simple conditions — it costs zero. It’s one of the most generous tax savings available today for buying a home in Portugal, and yet people still lose it over a detail nobody explained at the counter: a tax return filed as a dependant, a deed signed jointly with the wrong person, or the idea that “exempt” means “free” on everything else.

Let’s take it step by step.

What the exemption covers

The regime jovem (under-35 scheme) exempts buyers aged up to 35 from IMT and from the purchase stamp duty (0.8%) when they buy their first habitação própria e permanente (HPP, primary residence). The exemption is total up to €330,539 on the mainland — and up to €413,174 in the Azores and Madeira, where the brackets are 25% higher.

Between €330,539 and €660,982, the benefit doesn’t disappear all at once: it becomes partial. You pay 8% IMT and 0.8% stamp duty, but only on the excess above €330,539 — the slice up to that value stays exempt. Above €660,982, the benefit ends completely and you pay the normal tax on the whole value. In the autonomous regions, the ceiling for the partial regime rises to €826,228.

Who qualifies

The conditions are specific and all of them have to be met at the same time:

• Be up to 35 years old on the date of the escritura (deed).
• Be buying your first primary residence — you cannot have owned residential property in the last 3 years.
• Not be treated as a dependant for IRS (personal income tax) purposes in the year of purchase.

There’s no exception for someone who has a birthday partway through the process: your age counts on the day of the escritura, not the day you sign the CPCV (promissory purchase contract). That alone is a good reason not to let the process drag on — someone about to turn 36 gains months, not years, to close the deal within the deadline.

What it’s worth, in numbers

Take a €300,000 home, primary residence, on the mainland. Without the under-35 scheme, here’s the math:

Tax	Without regime jovem	With regime jovem
IMT	€300,000 × 7% − €10,457.96 = €10,542.04	€0 (exempt up to €330,539)
Stamp duty (purchase, 0.8%)	€2,400	€0
Total	€12,942.04	€0

The saving on this home is €12,942.04. And there’s another benefit that often gets overlooked: registration fees (emolumentos). At a Casa Pronta (one-stop deed service) desk, registering a purchase with a mortgage normally costs €700; with the under-35 scheme — and up to that same €330,539 ceiling — it costs €0. Add it all up and the real saving on this purchase comes to around €13,642, before you even talk about the mortgage.

To see the full bill for this purchase — deposit, registrations, valuation, commissions — use the total purchase costs calculator.

Trap 1: the stamp duty on your mortgage is always due

This is where most people trip up. The under-35 scheme exempts IMT and stamp duty on the purchase — it does not exempt the stamp duty on the mortgage, which is 0.6% of the capital financed on loans of 5 years or more. If you borrow €270,000 from the bank to finance that same home, you pay €270,000 × 0.6% = €1,620, exemption or not.

It’s a small amount compared with the €12,942 you save, but it’s the kind of cost that shows up on the final list at the escritura and catches people off guard — because they heard “exemption” and assumed the mortgage was included. It’s also the kind of hidden cost that adds up alongside others nobody counts on at the outset; it’s worth reading the full list in the guide on hidden costs of buying a home. Before choosing a bank, it’s also worth comparing mortgage offers: credit intermediaries, registered with Banco de Portugal and paid by the bank itself — never by the buyer — do that comparison work at no direct cost to the client.

Trap 2: buying jointly changes the math

If you buy on your own and meet the three requirements, the exemption is total. If you buy in co-ownership — with a spouse, partner or friend — the exemption only applies to the share of whoever, individually, meets the requirements. A buyer over 35, or who has owned a home in the last 3 years, doesn’t bring the benefit to their half: that share pays normal IMT and stamp duty, and only the other buyer’s share stays exempt.

In practice, this means a “joint” exemption is never the full exemption — it’s proportional to whoever, on the escritura, actually meets the conditions. It’s worth doing that math before signing a CPCV in two names, not after signing it.

Trap 3: the home has to remain your primary residence

The exemption isn’t a purchase reward — it’s a benefit conditional on what you do with the property. The home has to become your residence within six months of the purchase and remain your habitação própria e permanente (HPP) for six years. If within that period you give it another use — renting it out, turning it into a second home — or become a dependant for IRS purposes again, the benefit lapses and the AT (Tax Authority) can demand the tax you didn’t pay.

There are exceptions provided for: relocating for work to more than 100 km away, changes to the household (marriage, divorce, civil union, birth of children) — and the AT itself has already clarified that selling the home and buying another doesn’t require repaying the tax. But each exception has its own conditions: before making any decision about the home in the first six years, confirm the rules for your case with the Tax Authority.

How to request the exemption

You request it before the escritura, not after. The request is made on the Portal das Finanças or directly at the desk handling the deed — Casa Pronta or a notary. The exemption isn’t automatic: you have to request it and provide proof that you meet the requirements (age, first home, no residential property in the last 3 years). Without that request made in advance, you risk paying the full tax on the day of the escritura and having to request a refund afterwards — a slower, more bureaucratic process than securing the exemption from the start.

If your case also involves 100% financing, it’s worth looking at the garantia pública (state guarantee) in parallel: read the guide on the state guarantee for 100% financing and try the state guarantee calculator — the two measures were designed for the same young buyers and often fit the same purchase.

Your next calculation

You now know whether you meet the three requirements, and you want to see the real saving with your own purchase price, not the €300,000 example. That’s the calculation left to do — with your price, your age, and your IRS situation.