Massachusetts Real Estate Transfer Tax Calculator

Massachusetts assesses its deeds excise tax at $4.56 per $1,000 of consideration, 0.456% of the sale price, under M.G.L. Chapter 64D, a single statewide rate with one notable regional exception. Barnstable County, which covers Cape Cod, layers on a separate 2% land bank fee dedicated to open-space preservation, a levy with a conservation purpose rather than a general-revenue one, and it is not modeled in this calculator's statewide baseline.

By long-standing custom, the seller pays the deeds excise tax at closing, since the tax attaches to recording the seller's deed, though the purchase and sale agreement can reallocate this cost and seller-paid remains the market norm statewide. At 0.456%, Massachusetts sits close to Maine's 0.44%, a fellow New England state one border away past New Hampshire, though the two states arrive at nearly identical rates through very differently structured statutes.

On the calculator's $380,000 baseline, the deeds excise tax comes to $1,732.80 outside Barnstable County; a Cape Cod transaction should budget for the additional 2% land bank fee stacked on top of that statewide figure.

The calculator multiplies the entered sale price by Massachusetts's flat statutory rate of 0.456%. There are no brackets to apply and no mansion-tax cliff to check, since Massachusetts does not layer an additional high-value surcharge on top of the base excise tax at the state level.

1. Take the sale price. This is the full contracted consideration stated on the deed being recorded.
2. Apply the flat rate. Multiply the sale price by 0.00456 (0.456%, i.e. $4.56 per $1,000).
3. Round to the nearest cent using the same Decimal.js arbitrary-precision arithmetic used throughout this platform, so the result matches what a registry of deeds would actually assess.
4. Report net proceeds. The calculator also shows the sale price minus the tax due, useful for a seller estimating take-home proceeds at closing.

Because the rate is flat, the effective rate and the marginal rate are identical at every price point, unlike states that use graduated brackets or a mansion-tax cliff.

For a $380,000 sale price, the default scenario on this calculator:

• Sale price: $380,000
• Statutory rate: 0.456% ($4.56 per $1,000)
• Deeds excise tax due: $380,000 × 0.00456 = $1,732.80
• Net proceeds after transfer tax: $380,000 − $1,732.80 = $378,267.20

For a higher-value $1,500,000 sale, used as the luxury scenario on this calculator:

• Deeds excise tax due: $1,500,000 × 0.00456 = $6,840.00
• Net proceeds after transfer tax: $1,500,000 − $6,840.00 = $1,493,160.00

Notice that the effective rate stays exactly 0.456% at both price points. This is what distinguishes a flat-rate state like Massachusetts from a bracketed state like neighboring Rhode Island or Vermont, where the effective rate rises as the sale price climbs into higher tiers.

• The Cape Cod and Islands Land Bank fee. Barnstable County adds a separate 2% fee under different enabling legislation, which would roughly quadruple the total transfer-related cost on a Cape property.
• Recording fees and other closing costs. The Registry of Deeds charges a separate flat recording fee per document that is not part of the excise tax itself.
• Exemptions for certain transfers. Deeds between spouses, transfers to correct a title defect, and a handful of other statutory categories can be excise-exempt; this calculator assumes an ordinary arm's-length sale.
• Local option taxes some municipalities have proposed. Massachusetts has periodically debated allowing cities to add their own transfer fee on high-value sales, but no such local option is currently in effect statewide.
• Federal and state capital gains tax on the sale. The deeds excise tax is separate from any income tax owed on the seller's gain.

• Assuming the buyer pays. Massachusetts custom puts this cost on the seller's side of the settlement statement, which surprises buyers who are used to states where the tax is split or buyer-paid.
• Forgetting the Cape Cod land bank fee. Anyone working with a Barnstable County property needs to budget for a materially larger combined transfer cost than this statewide baseline shows.
• Confusing the excise tax with the recording fee. These are two separate line items charged by the registry of deeds and are easy to conflate when reading a closing statement.
• Using stamp count instead of dollar value. Older references to the tax describe it in terms of "$2.28 per $500," which is mathematically identical to $4.56 per $1,000 but trips people up when they try to reconstruct the total manually.

• Massachusetts Department of Revenue, Deeds Excise Tax (M.G.L. c.64D)
• engine/tables/2026/state-real-estate-transfer-tax.json, verified 2026-08-21