CRA Form NR73, Determination of Residency Status (Leaving Canada), is a voluntary questionnaire you send to the Canada Revenue Agency when you have left Canada or are about to leave and you want the CRA’s written opinion on whether you are still a Canadian resident for income tax purposes. That opinion matters because Canadian residents are taxed on worldwide income while non-residents are taxed only on Canadian-source income. You download the form from the CRA’s website, complete it, sign it, and mail or fax it to the International Tax Services Office at the address printed on the form.
Filing it is optional. Many people leaving Canada never send one and simply file their departure-year return as a non-resident based on their own reading of the facts. The form is worth the trouble when your situation is ambiguous enough that you want something in writing before you commit to a filing position.
When the Form Is Worth Filing
NR73 is aimed at people whose departure is clean enough to file without help but messy enough that they would rather not guess. Typical triggers: you still own a Canadian home, your spouse or children are staying behind for now, you plan to return seasonally, or you split the year between two countries. In any of those situations a written CRA opinion gives you something to point to if your return is later questioned.
One boundary to note before you start. NR73 is for people leaving Canada. If you are entering Canada and want a residency determination, the correct form is NR74. Do not use NR73 for an arrival.
What the CRA Weighs Before You Fill Anything In
The form asks question after question about your ties to Canada and to your new country. Answering well is much easier if you already know how the CRA groups those ties. Income Tax Folio S5-F1-C1 sorts them into three significant ties and a longer list of secondary ones.
The Three Significant Ties
Three connections carry the most weight, and keeping any one of them intact will usually leave you classified as a resident:
- A dwelling available for your use in Canada. It does not have to be owned. A rental unit you keep available, or a family home where your room is maintained, can count.
- A spouse or common-law partner who stays in Canada.
- Dependants who remain in Canada.
Severing all three is the single biggest step toward establishing non-resident status.
Secondary Ties
No secondary tie is decisive on its own, but a cluster of them can tip the balance:
- Personal property left in Canada: furniture, vehicles, clothing, recreational equipment.
- Social ties: memberships in Canadian recreational, religious, or community organizations.
- Economic ties: a Canadian employer, active involvement in a Canadian business, Canadian bank accounts, credit cards, and investment accounts.
- Provincial or territorial health insurance coverage.
- A driver’s licence or vehicle registration from a Canadian province or territory.
- A Canadian passport (one factor among many, not dispositive on its own).
- Active professional or union memberships in Canada.
The CRA and the courts have also considered a Canadian mailing address, a post office box, a safety deposit box, business cards showing a Canadian address, a Canadian telephone listing, and subscriptions to Canadian newspapers or magazines.
The 183-Day Rule
Even after you cut your ties, spending 183 days or more in Canada during the tax year can make you a deemed resident under subsection 250(1)(a) of the Income Tax Act, unless a tax treaty gives residency to another country. Every day or part of a day counts. The one exception is cross-border commuters who live in the United States and travel to a Canadian workplace; commuting days are excluded.
Filling Out the Form
Before you open the PDF, pull together your departure date, your new foreign address, and documentation for each tie above. The form is not long, but vague answers slow it down for months.
Identification and Departure Details
The opening section asks for your social insurance number, your last Canadian address, your date of departure, and your new address abroad. Your departure date anchors everything else, including your final Canadian tax return, so get it right and keep it consistent. The CRA also asks whether the move is temporary or permanent and, if temporary, when you expect to return.
Canadian Ties: What You Kept and What You Cut
Most of the form asks you to describe each residential tie: whether you kept or sold your Canadian home, whether your spouse and dependants left with you, whether you cancelled provincial health coverage, what you did with vehicles, memberships, and accounts. Be specific. Instead of “sold my house,” give the closing date and the buyer’s occupancy date. Instead of “cancelled health card,” give the province and the effective date. Vague answers trigger follow-up requests that add months to an already slow file.
Foreign Ties: Proving Where You Landed
The CRA also wants concrete evidence that you have settled somewhere else. Describe your foreign home in specific terms: a signed lease with its start date and duration, or a property deed with a purchase date. List any foreign employment contract, the employer, the country, and the start date. If you enrolled in a foreign health plan, obtained a foreign driver’s licence, or registered a vehicle abroad, include those details. Strong evidence of settling into another country makes it easier for the reviewer to conclude you are no longer a Canadian resident.
If you are moving somewhere covered by a Canadian tax treaty and you intend to rely on the treaty’s tie-breaker rules to be treated as a resident of the other country, say so and explain why the tie-breaker applies. The treaty position can override the domestic 183-day rule, and flagging it on the form helps the reviewer see the full picture.
The Statement of Facts
Near the end, the form gives you open space to explain anything the structured questions do not capture. This is where most people either help or hurt their case. If your departure is straightforward — permanent job abroad, home sold, family moved with you — a few confirming sentences are enough. If it is complicated, lay out the timeline. Kept a cottage. Spouse joining six months later. Return trips planned for seasonal work. A reviewer reading this section should be able to reconstruct your entire departure story without flipping back to the checkboxes.
Sign and date the form. Unsigned forms are returned without processing.
How To Submit It
Mail or fax the completed form to the International Tax Services Office using the address and fax number printed on the form. The office’s toll-free line for questions is 1-800-267-5177. Copy everything before you send it; you will want that copy if the CRA follows up, or years later if you are audited. Registered mail gives you a tracking number and proof of delivery, which is worth the cost for a document this important.
There is no online submission option for NR73. You fill out the PDF, print it, sign it, and send the paper copy.
What the CRA Sends Back
The CRA responds with a written opinion letter stating whether, based on the facts you gave, it considers you a resident or non-resident of Canada as of your departure date. As of early 2025, the published processing time for residency determinations is roughly fourteen months. If the reviewer needs more information, they will contact you at the phone number or address you provided, and the timeline stretches from there.
The opinion is not legally binding on you or on the CRA. The CRA has said it may not follow its own opinion when later assessing or reassessing a return. In practice the letter still carries real weight: if you file consistently with it, an auditor needs a strong reason to override the agency’s own prior determination. Keep the letter with your permanent tax records.
If your circumstances later change — you move back, your spouse returns, you reacquire a Canadian home — the earlier opinion no longer reflects reality, and you will need to reassess your status or submit a new NR73. You are free to file differently from the opinion, but doing so without solid documentation of your foreign ties raises your audit risk.
Other Filings Triggered by Leaving Canada
NR73 answers the residency question, but leaving Canada usually pulls in other forms. A searcher focused on NR73 should know these exist so nothing gets missed.
Departure Tax
Under section 128.1(4)(b) of the Income Tax Act, ceasing to be a Canadian resident triggers a deemed disposition of most of your property at fair market value on the day you leave, with an immediate reacquisition at the same amount. Unrealized capital gains become realized and are reported on your departure-year return. Canadian real estate, property used in a Canadian business through a permanent establishment, registered plans such as RRSPs, RRIFs, TFSAs, RESPs, and RDSPs, and certain property held by short-term residents are exempt.
The deemed disposition is reported on Form T1243, with the resulting gains or losses flowing to Schedule 3. If the total fair market value of your property at departure exceeds $25,000 (excluding cash, registered plans, and personal-use items worth less than $10,000 each), you also file Form T1161. Missing the T1161 deadline carries a penalty of $25 per day, with a $100 minimum and a $2,500 maximum. If the departure tax bill is large, you can elect to defer payment by filing Form T1244 by April 30 of the year after you leave; security may be required above certain thresholds.
Canadian Rental Income
Becoming a non-resident does not end your Canadian filing obligations if you still earn Canadian-source income. Rental income from Canadian property is the common case. By default, your tenant or property manager withholds 25 percent of the gross rent and remits it to the CRA. To pay tax on the net amount instead, you and your Canadian agent file Form NR6 on or before January 1 of the rental year (or before the first rental payment is due). Once approved, withholding is 25 percent of the net figure after expenses, and you file a Section 216 return on Form T1159 by June 30 of the following year to reconcile. If you own more than one Canadian rental property, all of the rental income goes on a single Section 216 return.