Buying off the plan in Victoria

Written and reviewed by Brandon Owens, Licensed Conveyancer (licence no. 001729L). Last reviewed 10 September 2026.

Buying off the plan in Victoria means committing to a property that does not exist yet. The upside can be a lower purchase price, a long lead time to save, and a meaningful stamp duty saving. The risks are just as real, and most of them are decided by what the contract says.

What does buying off the plan actually mean?

Buying off the plan means signing a contract of sale for a lot that has not yet been created as a separate title. The building may be unbuilt, partly built, or finished but not yet subdivided. You pay a deposit when you sign, and you settle later, once the plan of subdivision has registered at Land Use Victoria and a title for your individual lot exists.

The gap between signing and settling is commonly one to three years. Everything that makes off-the-plan different, good and bad, flows from that gap.

How the off-the-plan duty concession works

The off-the-plan duty concession reduces the dutiable value on which your stamp duty is calculated. Instead of paying duty on the full contract price, you pay duty on the contract price less the construction or refurbishment costs incurred on or after the contract date.

The earlier in the build you sign, the less of the construction has happened, the more is deducted, and the lower your duty. Buy at the very start of a project and the dutiable value can fall a long way below the price you are paying.

The temporary concession, to 20 April 2027

A temporary and much broader version of the concession currently applies. It covers contracts entered into on or after 21 October 2024 and on or before 20 April 2027. It was extended twice, most recently by six months in June 2026.

Under the temporary concession:

• There is no dutiable value cap.
• There is no requirement to live in the property.
• It is open to all purchasers, including investors, companies, trusts and foreign purchasers.
• It is limited to residential lots in a strata subdivision with common property — apartments, units and townhouses. A house-and-land package that is not in such a strata subdivision does not qualify.

If you are buying an apartment or townhouse in Victoria, this is the most valuable thing on this page. It is also time-limited, and the cut-off is the contract date, not the settlement date.

The ordinary concession, which resumes afterwards

For contracts entered into after 20 April 2027, the ordinary off-the-plan concession applies instead, and it is much narrower:

• Restricted to principal place of residence or first home buyer purchasers.
• The purchaser must be a natural person aged 18 or over, not a company or a trustee.
• Post-deduction dutiable value caps of $750,000 for first home buyers and $550,000 for principal place of residence buyers.
• The usual 12-month move-in and 12-month residence conditions apply.

One trap worth naming: foreign purchaser additional duty is calculated on the dutiable value before the off-the-plan concession is applied. The concession reduces your ordinary duty. It does not reduce the 8% surcharge.

What can go wrong, and what to check before signing

The duty saving is the easy part. These are the things that decide whether an off-the-plan purchase goes well.

Your finance has to survive the wait. A lender’s approval does not last one to three years, and the valuation that matters is the one done near completion, not the price you agreed at signing. If the market moves against you, or your income changes, you may be asked to find a larger cash contribution at exactly the moment you have least flexibility.

Sunset clauses. A sunset clause sets a date by which the plan must register or the building must be finished, and allows a party to end the contract if that date passes. Victoria restricts a vendor’s ability to rescind under a sunset clause, precisely because developers were once able to cancel contracts and resell at higher prices. Read the clause, know the date, and know who can use it.

What you are actually getting. Off-the-plan contracts are built around plans, specifications and a schedule of finishes. Those documents, not the display suite and not the render, are what the developer is obliged to deliver. Check the permitted variation to the lot size and the developer’s ability to substitute materials.

Owners corporation. Your lot will sit inside an owners corporation with its own rules, budget and levies. Those costs are ongoing and they start at settlement.

Defects. A newly completed building is inspected before settlement, not after. The window to raise defects and have them addressed is narrow, and it is set by the contract.

Is buying off the plan a good idea in Victoria?

It depends on whether the duty saving and the entry price outweigh the risk you take on the gap. Off-the-plan tends to suit buyers with secure income, a genuine cash buffer, and no fixed deadline for moving in. It suits buyers whose finance is marginal much less well.

The single most useful thing you can do is have the contract and the Section 32 reviewed before you sign, because after you sign the terms are set. Our guide to the Section 32 vendor statement explains what the vendor has to disclose to you.

How Lodgedwell handles off-the-plan purchases

We act on off-the-plan purchases across Victoria for the same fixed fee as any other purchase. That includes reviewing the contract and the Section 32, checking the sunset clause and the variation provisions, confirming which duty concession applies to your contract date, and staying with the matter through the long gap to registration and settlement.

This guide is general information about Victorian property law, current at 10 September 2026. It is not legal advice and does not take your circumstances into account. Conveyancing law differs between Australian states, and this page describes Victoria only.