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Capital gains exclusion on home sales

Program Information

Popular name

N/A

Program Number

TC.065

Program objective

The baseline tax system would not allow deductions and exemptions for certain types of income. In contrast, the Tax Code allows homeowners to exclude from gross income up to $250,000 ($500,000 in the case of a married couple filing a joint return) of the capital gains from the sale of a principal residence. To qualify, the taxpayer must have owned and used the property as the taxpayer’s principal residence for a total of at least two of the five years preceding the date of sale. In addition, the exclusion may not be used more than once every two years.

Program expenditures, by FY (2023 - 2025)

This chart shows obligations for the program by fiscal year. All data for this chart was provided by the administering agency and sourced from SAM.gov, USASpending.gov, and Treasury.gov.

For more information on each of these data sources, please see the About the data page.

Additional program information

OMB is working with the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) and agency offices of inspectors general to include links to relevant oversight reports. This section will be updated once this information is made available.

Program details

Categories & sub-categories

Tax Expenditures

Program types