You must be a first-time home buyer. That means in the 4-year period* before the home purchase, you didn’t:
- live in a home you owned, or
- live in a home your current spouse or common-law partner owned.
To be tax deductible, your RRSP contributions must be in your account for at least 90 days before you withdraw them for the HBP.
You must have an agreement in place to buy or build your new home before October 1st of the year after you made the withdrawal.
You intend to occupy the qualifying home as your principal place of residence. You must live in it within one year after buying or building it.
You must be a resident of Canada when you withdraw funds from your RRSP(s) under the HBP, and up to the time you buy or build a qualifying home.
*The 4-year period means the four years before a home purchase. The period begins on January 1 of the fourth year before you withdraw funds from your RRSP. The period ends 31 days before the date you withdraw the funds. For example, consider if you withdrew the funds on July 31, 2022. Then the 4-year period is from January 1, 2018, to June 30, 2022.