What is the Maine real estate transfer tax rate in 2026?
Two rates now apply under 36 M.R.S. §4641-A. Every deed transferring Maine real property pays $2.20 for each $500 or fraction of $500 of value, which is 0.44%. When the value exceeds $1,000,000, an additional $3.80 per $500 applies to the value above $1,000,000, which is another 0.76% on that slice.
Put together, the first $1,000,000 is taxed at 0.44% and every dollar above it at 1.2%. It works like an income tax bracket: the higher rate never touches the first million. A $900,000 duplex pays exactly what it would have paid before. A $3,000,000 apartment complex pays more than twice as much.
The higher tier came from L.D. 210, enacted as Public Law 2025, chapter 388, Part V, and Maine Revenue Services applies it to transfers on or after November 1, 2025. If your sale closed in October 2025, you paid the old rate. Every apartment sale in 2026 above $1,000,000 pays the new one.
Who pays transfer tax in Maine?
Both sides, equally. Section 4641-A(1)(B) imposes the tax one-half on the grantor and one-half on the grantee. Unlike states where custom decides, Maine writes the split into the statute, and it applies to both tiers.
The parties can still negotiate a credit so one side effectively covers the other’s half, and on a commercial deal that happens. But each party’s legal share is half, and the closing statement will normally show it that way.
How the tax is collected and reported
The county register of deeds collects it. When a deed is offered for recording, the register computes the tax from the value shown on the Real Estate Transfer Tax Declaration, collects it, and marks the declaration as paid, under §4641-B. The declaration must list the tax map and parcel number, the taxpayer identification numbers of any business-entity grantor or grantee, and evidence of compliance with Maine’s nonresident withholding rule.
Value means the actual consideration, and Maine’s definition includes the amount of any mortgages, liens or encumbrances, whether or not the buyer assumes the debt. For gifts or deeds with nominal consideration, value is fair market value. Nominal means less than 20% of the property’s assessed value as adjusted by the town’s certified ratio.
Maine has no separate city or town transfer tax on top of the state tax. Registers of deeds pay 90.8% of what they collect to the State Tax Assessor in fiscal years 2025-26 and 2026-27 and keep 9.2% for the county, under §4641-B(3).
Maine taxes controlling-interest transfers too
Selling the LLC instead of the building doesn’t avoid the tax in Maine. Section 4641-A(2) imposes the same rates, including the new tier above $1,000,000, on the transfer or acquisition within any 12-month period of a direct or indirect controlling interest in an entity that owns Maine real property.
A controlling interest means more than 50% of the capital, profits or beneficial interest in a partnership, LLC or trust, or more than 50% of the voting power or value of a corporation’s voting stock, under §4641(1-A). Acquisitions by people acting in concert are added together.
The parties must report the transfer to the register of deeds within 30 days on a return furnished by the State Tax Assessor and pay the tax with it. The split is still half and half, but if the transfer isn’t reported and paid within 30 days, buyer and seller become jointly and severally liable for the full amount. If the interest is sold in pieces, each transferor owes its proportional share.
Exemptions that matter to Maine apartment owners
Section 4641-C lists the exempt transfers. These are the ones that come up most with investment property:
- Deeds to an LLC from a corporation, partnership or another LLC, when the grantor or grantee owns the LLC in the same proportion as it owned the real estate (subsection 18).
- A mere change in identity or form of ownership with no change in beneficial ownership, whether by deed, conversion, merger or otherwise (subsection 19).
- Mergers or consolidations of business entities where no gain or loss is recognized (subsection 7), and certain deeds between family entities and their owners (subsection 16).
- Deeds to a trustee, nominee or straw party for the grantor as beneficial owner, and back again (subsection 15).
- Deeds between spouses, parent and child, or grandparent and grandchild without actual consideration, and deeds between spouses in divorce (subsection 4).
- Deeds of distribution from an estate and transfers under a transfer on death deed (subsections 11 and 21).
- Controlling-interest transfers that would be exempt if done by deed between the same parties (subsection 20).
Foreclosures, deeds in lieu and 1031 exchanges
Foreclosure relief in Maine is narrower than in many states. On a deed in lieu of foreclosure, only the mortgagor, meaning the owner giving up the property, is exempt; the lender taking title still owes its half on the property’s value. At a foreclosure sale to a third party, the grantor’s half applies only to proceeds above what’s needed to pay the mortgagee and junior claimants in full.
A 1031 exchange isn’t exempt. The sale of your relinquished building is a taxable deed, and you and your buyer each pay half at both tiers. The exchange defers federal and Maine income tax on the gain, but the transfer tax is a closing cost on each leg, and in an exchange you also pay your half when you buy the replacement property if it’s in Maine.
Worked example: Maine transfer tax on a $2M and $5M sale
Take a 28-unit building in Portland sold for $2,000,000 and a 75-unit complex in Bangor sold for $5,000,000.
For the $2,000,000 sale, the base tax is $2,000,000 ÷ $500 = 4,000 units × $2.20 = $8,800. The additional tier applies to the $1,000,000 above the threshold: 2,000 units × $3.80 = $7,600. The total is $16,400, or 0.82% of the price, and the seller and buyer each owe $8,200.
For the $5,000,000 sale, the base tax is 10,000 units × $2.20 = $22,000. The additional tier covers $4,000,000: 8,000 units × $3.80 = $30,400. The total is $52,400, about 1.05% of the price, or $26,200 for each side. Before November 1, 2025, the same sale would have carried $22,000 in total. Maine has no local add-on, so there’s no separate city line. Have your title company confirm the figure against the value on the declaration.
| Line item | $2,000,000 sale | $5,000,000 sale |
|---|---|---|
| Base tax, $2.20 per $500 on full value | $8,800 | $22,000 |
| Additional tax, $3.80 per $500 above $1,000,000 | $7,600 | $30,400 |
| Local add-on | $0 | $0 |
| Total transfer tax | $16,400 | $52,400 |
| Seller’s half | $8,200 | $26,200 |
| Buyer’s half | $8,200 | $26,200 |
| Total under the pre-November 2025 rate | $8,800 | $22,000 |
Maine compared with New Hampshire and Massachusetts
Even with the new tier, Maine’s combined rate on a $2,000,000 sale is about half of New Hampshire’s. New Hampshire charges $0.75 per $100 to each of the buyer and the seller under RSA 78-B, so the total is 1.5% of the price. Massachusetts charges a deeds excise of $2 per $500 under M.G.L. c. 64D, §1, or $1.50 per $500 in Barnstable County.
Massachusetts’ base excise is a little below Maine’s 0.44% base rate, and the gap widens fast above $1,000,000. Maine’s 1.2% rate on that slice pushes a $5,000,000 sale to $52,400, against $20,000 under the Massachusetts base rate.
| State | Rate | On a $2,000,000 sale | On a $5,000,000 sale |
|---|---|---|---|
| Maine | 0.44% to $1M, 1.2% above | $16,400 | $52,400 |
| New Hampshire | 0.75% from buyer plus 0.75% from seller | $30,000 | $75,000 |
| Massachusetts | $2 per $500 (0.4%) | $8,000 | $20,000 |
Nonresident withholding and other selling costs
Maine requires the buyer to withhold 2.5% of the consideration when the seller isn’t a Maine resident, under 36 M.R.S. §5250-A, and send it to the State Tax Assessor within 30 days. On a $2,000,000 sale that’s $50,000 held back. A resident seller can avoid it by certifying residency, and a nonresident can apply to Maine Revenue Services for a certificate that no tax is due or that adequate security has been provided. For a partnership, residency requires at least 75% Maine ownership.
The withholding is a prepayment, not the tax itself. The real income tax bill is federal capital gains tax, recapture of depreciation as unrecaptured Section 1250 gain at up to 25%, and Maine income tax on the gain. Those figures usually exceed the transfer tax many times over. A 1031 exchange defers them, and an installment sale can spread them out, but neither changes the transfer tax owed at closing.
Plan the transfer tax into your net proceeds early. At $2,000,000, your half is $8,200. At $5,000,000, it’s $26,200.
Selling your Maine apartment building to Skyline
Skyline buys apartment buildings with five or more units across Maine, including Portland, South Portland, Lewiston, Auburn, Bangor and Biddeford. We buy directly, can offer seller-carry terms if spreading out the gain helps, and work within 1031 timelines when you’re exchanging.
Send the address and unit count through the form on this page, or call (469) 660-2977. We typically respond within 48 hours, and our offer shows how the transfer tax splits between us at your price.
