Planning for the Life You’re Actually Trying to Live

Happy end of (personal) Tax Season / start of summer season!

Hopefully you’ve had time to get things filed. It’s not the end of the world if you missed the April 30th deadline for your income taxes. If you owe some money, then there is likely to be some interest applied. If you are owed money… well you won’t get interest in return, but it’s worth filing as soon as you can in either case!

At this time of year, people are finally able to turn their minds to financial planning. Perhaps some of what happened in your tax return you would prefer to not repeat in future years. Perhaps you simply felt unprepared. Or perhaps, you just have a little more brain space that isn’t otherwise occupied.

Maybe that’s why the Federal Government thought it was a great time to release a fiscal update. It’s not a new, comprehensive budget, which has typically been released in spring of each year. In 2025, the timing of the annual budget was permanently changed to fall of each year.

The update is, of course, long and wordy. There are different updates in there for different people. Given our role in your life, we thought we would summarize a few things for you:

The Employee Ownership Trust (EOT) Tax Exemption
An EOT is a structure that can purchase the shares in a company for the benefit of all of the company’s employees. In 2023, a temporary exemption was introduced on $10MM of capital gains for business owners who sell their companies to EOTs. The update proposes to make this permanent.

Canada Pension Plan (CPP) Contributions
The update proposes to reduce the contribution rate to base CPP from 9.9% (in total, paid equally by employers & employees, or paid solely by self-employed individuals) to 9.5%, effective January 2027. CPP is well known to be in excellent shape. The proposed reduction is a reflection of this.

RRSP Home Buyer’s Plan (HBP) Withdrawal Schedule
The HBP allows RRSP holders to withdraw up to $60,000 from their RRSP for the purchase of purchasing or building their first home, or a home for a specified person with a disability. The withdrawal is not taxable, provided it is repaid over a period of 15 years, starting the second year after the withdrawal is made.

Budget 2024 increased the grace period from two years to five years for withdrawals made between January 1, 2022 and December 31, 2025. Spring Update 2026 proposes to extend that grace period for withdrawals made up to the end of 2028.

Disability Tax Credit (DTC) Process Improvements
If you’ve ever gone through the process of applying for the DTC, you know how painful it can be. Spring Update 2026 proposes to reduce paperwork for medical practitioners – a key component of how slow the process is and how difficult it is to get approval. The application process is to be improved for certain long-lasting medical conditions such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s, and the practitioners who can certify eligibility has been expanded for certain types of conditions.

Financial Crimes Measures
The Spring 2026 update has advanced several anti-fraud and financial crime measures, which include:

• A ban on cryptocurrency ATMs
• Expanded FINTRAC (Financial Transactions & Reports Analysis Centre of Canada) powers to refuse, revoke, or prevent re-registration of non-compliant money services businesses, and increasing criminal record check requirements
• Capping NSF fees (already in effect) at $10 per incident for personal deposit accounts with federally regulated banks and credit unions. Provincial credit unison and business/corporate accounts fall outside of these rules.

The “Canada Strong” Sovereign Wealth Fund
There’s a fair amount of online chatter about this new sovereign wealth fund, launched with an initial $25 billion endowment. From what we know – which is not a lot – it is structured as an independent Crown corporation that reports to Parliament. The information provided has not yet been sufficient for the Spring team and our colleagues across the country to really dig into it and provide you with information on it. We hope that more information will arrive in the near future.

That’s just a taste of what has come out so far. You can find a summary, released by the government here. The implementation plan, called Bill C30, has been tabled for discussion in parliament. Further debate and voting is expected, so it’s not yet law. As of April 2026, the current government does have a majority, which means it is likely that the bill will pass.

A Little Extra news…

A “Notice of Ways and Means Motion” (NWMM) was introduced in early May that didn’t get the same fanfare as the Spring Update. This included:

• RESP Rule Revision: Certain caregivers are now allowed to be the “subscriber” for RESPs (the one who holds the account on behalf of beneficiaries). Current rules are a bit wacky in cases of marriage breakdown, death, or incapacity of a subscriber. This should make those transitions a fair bit easier.
• RDTOH Timing: If you have a privately owned company and you were claiming refundable tax there was previously the ability for a corporation to claim that refund before the shareholder paid his or her taxes on the dividend. Not anymore!
• Property Flipping: The 2023 property flipping rules require that if a property is sold within 12 months of acquisition, the “gain” is treated as regular income (100% taxable) instead of capital gains (50% taxable(. The NWMM tightens those rules even further to prevent structuring through the use of trusts
• Multigenerational Home Renovations: There’s a federal tax credit that can allow you to claim up to $50,000 of expenses if you create a self-constained secondary unit for eligible relatives to live in. This NWMM expands the list of eligible relatives, which previously included these family members over age 65 or eligible for the disability tax credit: parents, grandparents, children, grandchildren, siblings, aunts, uncles, nieces & nephews. The expanded list now includes the spouse, or common law partner of any of those listed family members.

What To Do Next

If any of the above specifically impact your plan and you have questions, please do reach out to us for discussion. There isn’t anything particularly “on fire” in our minds at the moment that everyone needs to act on.

What the Spring Update and NWMM reminds us, as all updates from government, geopolitical news,and market shifts tend to, is that change is always happening. Those changes that are outside of our direct control can feel overwhelming. We may feel that we should be doing something – anything – to manage the uncertainty in the world around us.

That’s a natural and reasonable response to changes. For each of us as individuals, what we need to ask is:

• Does this specific change impact something in my life?
• If so, what is the impact exactly? How much does it change my day-to-day life, and my potential future outcomes?

Often big external changes don’t have a lot of impact on our own individual plans. We may need to make a little tweak here, and a little tweak there. Often though, we don’ t need to change anything at all. The things that impact our plans the most are the ones that we actually do have control over:

• What we really want to achieve in our lives and the way we live them
• Our health
• What our families and communities might need from us, and what we might want to do to support them
• How much we spend

Those things you can control are the things to keep the closest watch on. Having regular check-ins, with yourself, with your spouse, with your family, with your community, are the ways to track those changes. That’s why we recommend regular “money meetings” with yourself and/or your spouse, annual family meetings with your key family members, and of course, an annual check-in with your financial planner.

With these key actions in place, you can stay on top of everything, with the support of the professionals whose job it is to pay attention to those external forces, and align them with what you know best: you.

Your Spring Plans team is always booking ahead, and if you would like a fall check-in, after you’ve had a wonderful summer season, please reach out to info@springplans.ca to book a meeting.

Your Spring Planning Team

Practice Notes:

Julia will be attending two important industry conferences that support both the human and technical sides of financial and family enterprise planning, helping her continue bringing both technical depth and a human-centred perspective to the work we do with clients every day.

From May 25–27, 2026, she will attend the Family Enterprise Canada Symposium in Vancouver, focused on family enterprise, succession, governance, communication, and navigating complex family dynamics. The event brings together advisors and business families to explore the real-life challenges that exist underneath financial decisions.

She will also attend the STEP Canada National Conference in Toronto on June 1–2, 2026. This conference focuses on advanced estate, trust, tax, and cross-border planning, helping advisors stay current on evolving technical strategies and legislation.

IMPORTANT REMINDER FOR BC REAL ESTATE OWNERS: If you’ve been deferring your property taxes under the provincial program, there have been significant changes. For deferral for the years 2025 and before, the interest charged is “simple”. For the years 2026 forward – and not impacting previous years – the interest charged is “compounded”. Click here for an explanation of the differences between these two interest systems. This makes the deferment program a great deal less cool. That doesn’t mean it’s a bad idea, but it does mean that the parameters have changed. Please review the changes before applying for this program this year.

Your Spring team is part of a consortium of financial professionals who have been petitioning the BC government to roll back this change. We haven’t had a lot of response, but we are still trying!

Have more questions? Drop us a note at info@springplans.ca.

Spring in the News:

Julia recently contributed to a Globe and Mail feature exploring the complexities of multigenerational family business succession, and what happens when history, expectations, identity, and family relationships all show up in the same room. You can find the full article here.

Julia also joined Athena Collective’s “Money Moves” event alongside an incredible group of women leaders and founders for a conversation about financial confidence, entrepreneurship, and building healthier relationships with money. The discussion focused on creating more open, honest, and supportive financial conversations, especially during periods of growth, transition, and uncertainty. Check out some of the fun that was had here.

Please check out our media page here for videos, podcasts, interviews and more.

Planning News Digest:

Many businesses talk about their values, but few know how to translate these into action. Our good friend Ian Macnaughton wrote about values in a family enterprise, and we think you’ll find it really useful. Check out the full article here.

The Federal Government released a 2026 Spring Economic Update. If you like reading that kind of thing, you can find the full update here.

Younger generations are becoming increasingly intentional about philanthropy and impact. This Globe & Mail story offers a thoughtful look at that shift, and the kinds of conversations with advisors that can help support values-driven giving. Check it out here.

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