Sint Maarten revokes property and dividend taxes that were never applied

The Government of Sint Maarten initiated a tax reform, the goal being to “simplify the system” by “shifting as much as possible from direct taxes more to indirect taxes”, said Richard Gibson, the Dutch side Minister of Finance, during the government’s weekly press conference.

This simplification starts by getting rid of those tax laws that were put in place before Sint Maarten became a country.  While the Minister recalled that revenues were insufficient and that balancing the budget was a real challenge, he announced the Council of Ministers’s approval to repeal certain laws that did not serve the interests of the population and returned nothing because they were not applied. Among them, property tax.

“While property tax appear in the books, it has never generated revenues, and hasn’t for many, many, many, many years”, comments Richard Gibson. 

It is true that the existence of this tax was completely ignored by everyone, included real estate agents.

"There is no real estate or property taxes applied to properties on the Dutch side", one can read on www.stmaartenproperty.net. Century 21 confirms it: “There is no annual tax for owning a property in St. Maarten”. Now, it is official. 

Another tax that should be taken off the book is the dividend tax which has not been producing anything.

The procedure is being implemented and the Parliament has yet to vote on the decision.