Residency and visa status: who qualifies for first home buyer grants
Citizenship and PR tests for first home buyer grants differ by scheme and by state — what's verified, what isn't, and where New Zealand citizens stand.
Who qualifies for a first home buyer grant based on residency or visa status?
There’s no single national answer — citizenship and residency tests differ by scheme, and even between states running the same type of scheme. The mistake that costs readers the most is assuming one scheme’s rule applies to another. What’s verified: most state First Home Owner Grants ask that at least one applicant be an Australian citizen or permanent resident; the Home Guarantee Scheme (5% Deposit Scheme) needs a citizen or permanent resident; and Help to Buy is the sharp exception — citizens only, permanent residents are not eligible.
Stamp duty concessions run their own separate tests again, and New South Wales and Victoria don’t even agree with each other on how many buyers in a couple need to meet the test. Each is set out below with its source, and where a state’s position genuinely isn’t confirmed on an official page, it’s marked as such rather than guessed at.
A permanent resident holds a permanent visa but isn’t an Australian citizen. New Zealand citizens sit in an unusual middle position in Australian immigration law — most receive a Special Category Visa (subclass 444) on arrival — and, as you’ll see below, how that visa is treated for grant purposes is one of the least-published details in this whole area. Where it isn’t confirmed, this article says so plainly rather than reasoning from “New Zealand citizens have a special status in Australia” to a conclusion about any specific grant.
Does citizenship or PR status vary by state for the First Home Owner Grant?
Yes. Here’s the position for each jurisdiction’s own grant, all confirmed current as at July 2026:
| Jurisdiction | Citizenship / residency test for the grant |
|---|---|
| NSW | At least one buyer: citizen or PR |
| VIC | At least one buyer: citizen or PR |
| QLD | Citizen or PR, or joint applicant |
| SA | At least one buyer: citizen, PR, or NZ citizen with SCV |
| WA | At least one buyer: citizen or PR |
| TAS | Citizen or PR (one suffices if joint) |
| ACT | No grant — see note below |
| NT | Citizen or PR at application (joint: one suffices) |
Seven of these use the same core rule, just worded slightly differently: NSW, VIC, WA, TAS, NT and SA all require at least one applicant to be an Australian citizen or permanent resident (TAS and NT phrase it as “for joint applicants, only one need be”; SA’s own wording separately names a New Zealand citizen holding a Special Category Visa and permanently residing in Australia as also meeting the test), and QLD’s “applying jointly with one” means the same thing in substance.
The ACT abolished its First Home Owner Grant in 2019 and replaced it with the Home Buyer Concession Scheme, a stamp duty concession rather than a cash grant. That scheme doesn’t run a citizenship test at all — instead, every buyer and their domestic partner must not have owned or held an interest in property anywhere in the last five years, which is a different kind of test entirely and reaches further than “first home buyer” literally means.
South Australia’s grant conditions are now confirmed directly on RevenueSA’s site: at least one applicant must be an Australian citizen, permanent resident, or a New Zealand citizen holding a Special Category Visa and permanently residing in Australia, and all applicants must occupy the home as their principal place of residence for a continuous six months, starting within 12 months of completion.
Each jurisdiction’s own grant page: NSW · VIC · QLD · WA · TAS · NT · ACT.
Can New Zealand citizens living in Australia get the First Home Owner Grant?
It depends which state, and that’s the honest answer — there’s no uniform national position, and most jurisdictions publish a specific rule for New Zealand citizens that goes beyond the general citizen-or-PR test:
- Queensland: a New Zealand citizen holding a Special Category Visa and a current New Zealand passport is treated as a permanent resident for the QLD First Home Owner Grant specifically.
- South Australia: a New Zealand citizen holding a Special Category Visa and permanently residing in Australia is named directly, alongside citizens and permanent residents, as meeting the SA First Home Owner Grant’s applicant test.
- Victoria: for settlements before 26 November 2025, a New Zealand citizen needed both a Special Category Visa and physical presence in Australia to qualify. From 26 November 2025, New Zealand citizens are eligible to apply for the VIC grant whether or not they hold that visa.
- The ACT’s Home Buyer Concession Scheme: this one doesn’t turn on the visa question at all — the scheme runs no citizenship or residency test of any kind, only the five-year no-prior-ownership rule that applies identically to every buyer. A Special Category Visa holder is neither included nor excluded by citizenship, because citizenship isn’t part of the test.
- New South Wales: the grant’s own application form confirms a New Zealand citizen holding a Special Category Visa is treated as a permanent resident for the NSW First Home Owner Grant, provided they’re living in Australia as at the commencement date of the eligible transaction.
- Tasmania and the Northern Territory: both states’ First Home Owner Grant Acts define “permanent resident” for grant purposes to include a New Zealand citizen holding a Special Category Visa (subclass 444) under the Migration Act 1958 (Cth) — the same basis as everywhere else a citizen-or-PR test applies.
- Western Australia: confirms only the general “citizen or permanent resident” test for its own First Home Owner Grant; Special Category Visa (subclass 444) treatment specifically is not confirmed on an official page. Stays a placeholder below rather than being assumed to follow the NSW, TAS or NT position.
- The Home Guarantee Scheme (5% Deposit Scheme): eligibility is stated as “Australian citizen or permanent resident,” using the meaning in the Australian Citizenship Act 2007 (Cth) — whether a Special Category Visa meets that specific legal test is not confirmed on any official firsthomebuyers.gov.au page as at July 2026. Check firsthomebuyers.gov.au or contact Housing Australia directly for the current position.
- Help to Buy: because this scheme requires all applicants to be Australian citizens — not citizens or permanent residents — a New Zealand citizen holding only a Special Category Visa does not meet that test, regardless of how long they’ve lived in Australia, unless they’ve separately become an Australian citizen. This follows directly from Help to Buy’s own citizens-only rule, not from any assumption about the visa’s general status.
Whether a Special Category Visa (subclass 444) meets the WA First Home Owner Grant’s eligibility test is not confirmed on any official WA government page as at July 2026 — check wa.gov.au or contact RevenueWA directly for the current position. Whether a Special Category Visa (subclass 444) meets the Home Guarantee Scheme’s “permanent resident” test under the Australian Citizenship Act 2007 (Cth) is not confirmed on any official firsthomebuyers.gov.au page as at July 2026 — check firsthomebuyers.gov.au or contact Housing Australia directly for the current position.
Does permanent residency guarantee eligibility across every scheme?
No — and this is the single most important thing to take from this article. Being a permanent resident opens the door to some schemes and closes it on others:
- NSW stamp duty concession (First Home Buyers Assistance Scheme): at least one buyer needs to be an Australian citizen or permanent resident.
- VIC stamp duty concession: all purchasers need to be Australian citizens or permanent residents — a real and material difference from NSW’s “at least one” test, for what looks like the same type of concession.
- Home Guarantee Scheme (5% Deposit Scheme): citizen or permanent resident, 18 or over.
- Help to Buy: Australian citizens only — permanent residents are not eligible, full stop. A permanent resident who qualifies for the Home Guarantee Scheme or a state grant can still be locked out of Help to Buy specifically, purely on citizenship.
Beyond these, don’t assume a permanent resident automatically qualifies for every first home buyer benefit in every state — check the specific scheme.
This is also a good place to be clear about what this article does not cover: foreign purchaser duty surcharges and FIRB (Foreign Investment Review Board) approval are a separate regime from first home buyer grant and concession eligibility, assessed on different criteria entirely. A reader’s citizenship or residency status for grant purposes says nothing about their FIRB position, and this article makes no claim about either — see firb.gov.au for that different question.
What should you do if your visa situation doesn’t fit neatly into these categories?
Eligibility for every scheme above is assessed by the relevant revenue office or Housing Australia against your actual visa, citizenship documents and property ownership history — this article sets out the tests each scheme publishes, but it can’t confirm your own eligibility for you. If your visa situation is anything other than straightforward Australian citizenship or permanent residency, a registered migration agent or immigration lawyer can confirm your visa’s status, and the revenue office or Housing Australia can confirm how that status is treated for the specific scheme you’re considering.
For the deposit-size question that usually comes next once eligibility is clear, see our guide to how much deposit you need for a first home in Australia.
