Newsflash Guatemala: Institutional Tax Ruling No. 3-2025

Picture of Jorge Flores

Jorge Flores

The Superintendency of Tax Administration published institutional tax criterion No. 3-2025 dated November 3, 2025, entitled “Application of Value Added Tax or Stamp Duty and Special Stamped Paper for Protocols in the sale or exchange of real estate.”

The purpose of this criterion is to modify and repeal institutional tax criterion No. 12-2018: “Application of Value Added Tax or Stamp Duty on the sale or exchange of real estate.”

Among the most relevant modifications that criterion No. 3-2025 made to criterion No. 12-2018 are:

    1. The word “exchange” was added to the first question for taxpayers and to sections A and B of the “cases under analysis.”
    2. In some cases, the word ‘sale’ was replaced by the word “purchase.” In some cases, the term “sales contract” is even mentioned.
    3. Article 12 of the Regulations of the Stamp Tax Law was added to the legal basis of the criterion.
    4. In the case of the second sale or exchange of real estate, the modification was made in that the second or subsequent sales of real estate are subject to stamp tax, considering that the corresponding tax was paid on the first registration of ownership of any title. Previously, they were subject to the tax, considering that VAT was paid on the first sale or exchange of the real estate.
    5. In the same case, it was added that the stamp tax base will be determined based on the value recorded under oath in the public deed by the seller or exchanger.
    6. In the same case, the provisions of Article 3 of the Regulations of the Stamp Duty Law and the ruling of the Constitutional Court in its judgment of May 13, 2014, in case 317-2013, were added; in that the second or subsequent sales or exchanges of real estate are those recorded in the Property Registry, after the first registration of ownership under any title, operated in said registry.
    7. In the section on institutional criteria, in case B) of the stamp duty. The provision regarding what is considered a second or subsequent sale was amended to include those recorded in the RGP after the first registration of ownership, provided that the corresponding tax has been paid. Previously, it stated that it was when VAT had been paid.
    8. In the same section, among the comparable elements that must be used to determine the higher value of the property for tax base purposes, the value recorded in the municipal registry was added as an element.