Tax when you leave Australia

Once you’re a foreign resident for tax, Australia only taxes your Australian income, but at 30 percent from the first dollar. Sell your old home while you’re living overseas and you can lose the main residence exemption completely. And if you settle in Thailand, it may tax the money you bring in.

This is for Australians leaving to live in Thailand or Vietnam. The year you leave is the most complicated tax year most people ever have, and some decisions, especially about your home, are hard to undo once you’ve gone. Use a registered tax agent who regularly handles departures.

Are you still an Australian tax resident?

Your passport doesn’t decide this, and leaving the country isn’t automatically enough. The ATO applies four tests: whether you “reside” in Australia (the main one), whether your domicile is still Australia, the 183-day test, and the Commonwealth super fund test for some government employees.

It looks at how long you’re away and whether you mean to come back, where your partner and children live, whether you keep a home here, and your work and social ties. People who keep a home, a spouse or a job in Australia often stay residents even while living mostly overseas.

A simpler “bright-line” residency test has been proposed for years. It isn’t law as of October 2026.

What changes once you’re a foreign resident

The resident 16 percent rate drops to 15 percent from 1 July 2026 and 14 percent from 1 July 2027. Foreign resident rates don’t change with it.

The Australia–Thailand tax treaty only cuts dividend withholding for holdings of 25 percent or more, so ordinary shareholders living in Thailand pay the full 30 percent on unfranked dividends. Vietnam’s treaty cuts it to 15 percent.

Tell your bank, broker and share registries your new overseas address and residency, or they may withhold at the wrong rate.

The year you leave

There’s no ATO departure form. You lodge a normal return for the year you leave, showing the date you stopped being a resident. You’re taxed as a resident on everything up to that date, and as a foreign resident on Australian income after it.

Before you go:

• Tell your employer, bank, super fund and share registries.
• Decide what to do about shares and other non-property assets (next section).
• Decide what happens to your home, with advice.
• Book a departure-year return with a tax agent.

Shares and other assets when you leave

When you stop being a resident, you’re treated as if you sold your non-property assets (shares, managed funds and so on) at market value that day. You can choose instead to defer this and be taxed when you actually sell, but then they stay in the Australian tax net. Australian real estate isn’t affected, because it’s always taxable here.

If you sell an asset while you’re a foreign resident, the 50 percent CGT discount only applies to the part of your ownership while you were a resident (for gains after 8 May 2012).

Your home and the main residence exemption

This is where people lose the most money.

The “six-year rule” lets you treat your former home as your main residence for up to six years while you rent it out (indefinitely if you don’t). But since the 2019 changes, foreign residents at the time of sale generally get no main residence exemption at all, not even for the years they lived there. So the six-year rule only protects you if you’re an Australian resident again when you sell.

The exception is the life events test. It applies if you’ve been a foreign resident for six years or less and, in that time, you or your spouse or child under 18 is diagnosed with a terminal illness, your spouse or child under 18 dies, or the sale follows a formal relationship breakdown.

That leaves three choices: sell before you leave, keep the home and come back before you sell, or accept that a sale while you’re overseas will be taxed. A tax agent can run the numbers on each.

If you keep it as a rental, the rent is taxable in Australia at foreign resident rates. You lodge a return each year and claim the usual deductions.

Super

• Your super stays in Australia and keeps growing. You can’t cash it out when you leave: the Departing Australia Superannuation Payment is only for temporary visa holders, not citizens or permanent residents.
• The preservation age is now 60 for everyone.
• Payments from a taxed super income stream after 60 are tax-free in Australia. That doesn’t make them tax-free where you live (see the Thailand section).
• Check whether the life and income protection insurance inside your fund still covers you overseas.

Medicare and the levy

Foreign residents are exempt from the 2 percent Medicare levy; you claim the exemption in your return. Medicare doesn’t cover you overseas at all. Smartraveller says you can still use it on visits home for up to five years after you move, and not after that unless you come back to live.

HELP and other study debts

Your HELP debt follows you. If you’ll be overseas 183 days or more in any 12 months:

• Lodge an overseas travel notification with the ATO within seven days of leaving.
• Report your worldwide income each year by 31 October, converted to Australian dollars. If it’s A$16,750 or less for 2025-26, lodge a non-lodgment advice instead.
• Repay once worldwide income passes the threshold: A$67,000 in 2025-26 and A$69,528 in 2026-27.

Debts were cut by 20 percent in 2025, so check your new balance in myGov before you plan repayments.

Thailand: tax on money you bring in

Since 1 January 2024, Thailand taxes its tax residents on foreign income brought into the country, if it was earned from 2024 on. You’re a Thai tax resident if you’re in Thailand 180 days or more in a calendar year. Thai rates run from 0 to 35 percent.

What that means if your money comes from Australia:

• Bringing in savings you held before 2024 is generally fine. Keep records that show when the money was earned.
• Rent, dividends, salary or super income earned from 2024 on and brought into Thailand can be taxable there, even if Australia has already taxed it. The tax treaty usually lets you offset the Australian tax, but not always.
• Under the Australia–Thailand treaty, a pension for past government service (a public service or military pension, for example) is generally taxable only in Australia. Other pensions and annuities are generally taxable only where you live. The treaty doesn’t clearly deal with super lump sums.
• A proposed exemption for foreign income brought in within the same or the next year had still not been published in the Royal Gazette in September 2026, so it isn’t law.
• If you have to file in Thailand, you’ll need a Thai tax ID number.

The Long-Term Resident (LTR) visa includes an exemption for foreign income, which is one reason higher earners use it.

Vietnam: tax on worldwide income

Vietnam is tougher on paper. It taxes its tax residents (generally 183 days or more in a year) on worldwide income, not just what they bring in. The Australia–Vietnam treaty decides which country gets to tax what. If you’ll live in Vietnam with meaningful Australian income, see a Vietnamese tax adviser as well as your Australian one.

Who to see before you go

• A registered tax agent who regularly handles Australians leaving the country. Ask how many departure returns they do each year.
• A licensed financial adviser with overseas experience, if you’re making decisions about super, shares or property.
• A local tax adviser in Thailand or Vietnam if you’ll be a tax resident there with income to bring in.

For the day-to-day money side, see banking when you move to Asia and sending money from Australia.