WA first home buyers
WA First Home Owner Grant
The Western Australian First Home Owner Grant is a one-off payment of up to $10,000 for buying or building a new or substantially renovated home, subject to a property value cap and a set of eligibility rules administered by RevenueWA.
Your Mortgage Broker Cottesloe is a mortgage broking business serving Perth's western suburbs, and this page covers what the grant pays, who qualifies, which properties it covers, how it interacts with transfer duty relief, and what commonly goes wrong with claims.
What It Is Worth Right Now
The grant amount has stayed steady while the rules around it have moved, which catches a lot of first buyers out. The payment itself is up to $10,000, once per eligible transaction, and it only attaches to a new residential home or a substantially renovated one, whether you buy the finished product or build it yourself.
Two recent changes matter more than the payment size. The value cap south of the 26th parallel, which includes every Perth suburb, rose to $800,000 for transactions on or after 7 May 2026, lifting the ceiling from the $750,000 that applied to earlier transactions. Meanwhile the exclusion of established homes, in place since contracts dated on or after 3 October 2015, remains firmly in force. Older articles still circulating quote both the old cap and an old duty threshold, so check dates on anything you read before you plan around a figure.
Who Qualifies
Eligibility turns on the applicant, the property and your conduct after settlement, and RevenueWA assesses all three: the published criteria are worth reading in full before you sign anything.
Age and legal capacity
Citizenship or residency
First buyer history
Occupancy commitment
No means test
Application deadline
Which Properties It Covers
The grant and the duty relief cover different property types at different values, which is where most confusion starts: the two schemes overlap but are not the same thing.
| Situation | First Home Owner Grant | First home owner rate of duty |
|---|---|---|
| New home under $600,000 (Perth) | Eligible, up to $10,000 | No duty payable |
| New home $600,001 to $800,000 | Eligible, up to $10,000 | Reduced duty applies |
| Established home up to $800,000 | Not eligible | No duty under $600,000, reduced above |
| Vacant land up to $550,000 | Not eligible | No duty under $450,000, reduced above |
Why The Rule Bites Here
Cottesloe is a difficult suburb to spend the grant in, and the numbers explain why: the eligibility rule points you at new and substantially renovated homes under $800,000, and that stock is thin on the ground here compared with most of Perth.
Where New Stock Actually Sits
Dwelling approvals in Cottesloe have run at 370 over the last five years, against 2,892 total dwellings, so the suburb is not churning out new housing stock at pace. What gets approved skews toward replacement dwellings on substantial blocks rather than affordable product, and the building-activity percentile of 82 within the state reflects steady but high-end activity rather than volume.
The Median And The Cap
The suburb's market profile, a median household income of about $3,351 a week at the ninety-eighth income percentile and the highest SEIFA advantage decile, points to a price base well above what the cap would fund, though no suburb median figure appears in the data available to this page. The practical reading is simple: an $800,000 ceiling that clears most of metropolitan Perth does far less work here.
The Eligibility And Desirability Gap
With 69.1 per cent of dwellings being separate houses and only 18.6 per cent flats or apartments, the homes that dominate this suburb are precisely the established stock the grant excludes. A substantially renovated home under the cap is the realistic local target, and genuinely renovated product at that price point attracts strong competition from buyers who do not need the grant at all.
What It Means For Your Search
Most grant-dependent buyers succeed by widening the search ring: new builds and off-plan apartments in adjoining suburbs, house and land further out, or a substantially renovated property priced under the cap. Our first home buyer loans page covers how deposit and lender settings work once you have found an eligible property.
How It Stacks With Duty Relief
The second scheme is where many first buyers save more than the grant is worth, yet the two are routinely confused: the first home owner rate of duty is separate, with its own thresholds, and since 7 May 2026 the two no longer share a cap.
No duty on established homes to $600,000
A concessional band above that
Vacant land gets its own tiers
The cap link is gone
The stacking case
How it works
How To Apply And When Money Arrives
The mechanics are less daunting than the eligibility rules, and the main risk is deadline discipline rather than paperwork: RevenueWA's grant page sets out the current process.
- 1
Two Ways To Lodge
You can apply online directly with RevenueWA, or through an approved agent, which in practice usually means your lender. Most buyers with a mortgage lodge through the lender, because the application rides alongside the loan approval and the paperwork is largely the same bundle of identity and contract documents.
- 2
The Twelve Month Deadline
The application must be lodged within twelve months of the completion date of the eligible transaction, and that clock runs whether or not you have got around to it. For a purchase, completion is settlement; for a build, it is when the transaction completes, so mark the date and set a reminder well inside the window.
- 3
When The Money Is Paid
The published pages do not state fixed processing times by purchase type, so no dates can be promised here. What RevenueWA does state is that the grant is paid once the eligible transaction completes, and that the payment is one-off, at the amount claimed or the consideration paid if that figure is lower.
- 4
Keeping The Grant After Payment
Eligibility does not end at payment. The six-month continuous occupancy requirement, commencing within twelve months of completion, applies after you have the money, and RevenueWA can claw the grant back if the condition is not met, so treat the occupancy commitment as a term of the deal rather than a formality.
Worth knowing early
What Gets An Application Knocked Back
Most refused claims are avoidable, and the refusal usually traces back to one of a handful of misreadings of the rules, so read this list before you commit to a contract rather than after.
- Buying established stock The single most common knock-back is expecting the grant on an established home, which has been excluded since contracts dated on or after 3 October 2015 at any price point.
- Breach of the cap A contract south of the 26th parallel above $800,000 fails the value cap, and buyers who read the old $750,000 figure from dated articles get caught on the arithmetic.
- Skipping the occupancy period Not living in the home for six continuous months, or moving in later than twelve months after completion, puts the grant in clawback territory even after it has been paid.
- Prior ownership surprises An applicant who previously owned property before 1 July 2000, or owned and occupied a home for six months or more after 1 July 2004, or claimed a grant in another state, is ineligible.
- Assuming the schemes are one Treating the grant cap and the duty thresholds as the same figures has real costs, because they are separate schemes with different values and different eligible property types.
- Missing the lodgement window Applications lodged more than twelve months after completion are refused, and there is no discretion worth banking on.
Where we work
Areas We Service
Beyond Cottesloe, Your Mortgage Broker Cottesloe works with first home buyers across Perth's western suburbs, including Swanbourne, Claremont, Peppermint Grove and Mosman Park. If you are weighing an eligible new build against an established home nearby, our About page explains who you would actually be dealing with and how we are paid.
Questions answered
Frequently Asked Questions
How much is the WA First Home Owner Grant worth?
It is a one-off payment of up to $10,000 for buying or building a new or substantially renovated home, subject to the value cap and the eligibility criteria administered by RevenueWA.
Can I get the grant on an established home?
No. Contracts to buy an established home dated on or after 3 October 2015 are not eligible for the grant at any price, though the separate first home owner rate of duty may still apply.
What is the property price cap for the grant?
For transactions south of the 26th parallel, including all of Perth, the cap is $800,000 for transactions on or after 7 May 2026. North of the parallel, the cap is $1,000,000.
Do I have to live in the property to keep the grant?
Yes. You must live in the home as your principal place of residence for at least six continuous months, starting within twelve months of completion, or the grant can be clawed back.
Is the grant different from stamp duty relief?
Yes, they are separate schemes with different figures. The grant applies only to new or substantially renovated homes under the cap, while duty relief also covers established homes and vacant land up to its own thresholds.
How long does the grant take to arrive?
RevenueWA does not publish fixed processing dates, and the grant is paid once the eligible transaction completes. You must lodge within twelve months of the completion date, online or through an approved agent such as your lender.
Mortgage broker for Cottesloe and the suburbs around it
Get In Touch
Grant eligibility, duty thresholds and lender policy interact in ways that are easier to check than to guess, and a contract signed on a misread rule is expensive to unwind. Call (08) 6311 4005 to talk it through with a broker, or review our published fee and commission structure before you commit to anything.