The products and providers tax/harmonized gross sales tax (GST/HST) credit score is a tax-sheltered quarterly payout that helps low- and modest-income households offset their GST or HST funds. This tax credit score might embrace funds from provincial and territorial packages.

In line with the Canada Income Company (CRA), you might be eligible for the GST/HST credit score in case you are a Canadian resident over the age of 19.

How a lot do you have to get through the GST/HST tax credit score?

The quantity you obtain through the tax credit score is determined by elements resembling your internet household earnings, marital standing, and whether or not you might have any kids. To qualify for the credit score, your adjusted internet household earnings have to be decrease than a sure threshold. For the 2022 base 12 months (cost interval from July 2023 to June 2024), the edge for the tax credit score ranges from $52,255 to $69,105.

The utmost GST/HST tax credit score for a person is $496, whereas it will increase to $650 for married {couples}. Eligible Canadians will obtain $171 for every little one under the age of 19.

It’s important to maintain your private data up to date to keep away from underpayments or overpayments by the CRA. For example, a rise in a household’s internet earnings would have an effect on these funds beginning in July 2024.

Reinvest these tax credit in high quality index funds

Regardless of macro headwinds resembling rising rates of interest and inflation, it’s important to place the payouts from these tax credit to work. The one means Canadians can lead a snug life in retirement is by investing in inflation-beating property and benefiting from the ability of compounding.

One asset class that has persistently outpaced inflation is equities. For instance, the S&P 500 Index has returned over 10% yearly within the final 5 a long time.

Whereas the payouts from the tax credit may not appear too giant at first, investing the advantages in low-cost index funds that observe the S&P 500 Index can assist you create a retirement nest egg over time.

Given an annual price of return of 10%, a $200 month-to-month funding would balloon to greater than $455,000 over 30 years. If you’ll be able to save $500 every month, your funding can be price $1.14 million after three a long time, at 10%.

One low-cost index fund that tracks the S&P 500 is the Vanguard S&P 500 Index ETF (TSX:VSP). Investing in high quality index funds supplies diversification at a low value, which reduces funding dangers. It might sound engaging to spend money on different subtle merchandise that goal to beat the broader markets. Nonetheless, you must perceive that greater than 80% of large-cap mutual funds fail to beat the benchmark index.

The highest holdings of the VSP ETF embrace tech giants resembling Microsoft, Apple, Nvidia, Meta, Amazon, and Alphabet, which account for greater than 20% of the fund. The truth is, the high-growth tech sector accounts for 30.5% of the VSP, adopted by healthcare at 12.8%, monetary providers at 12.65%, and shopper cyclical at 10.5%.

Whereas the VSP ETF might sound tech-heavy, it supplies publicity to a number of the largest corporations on this planet. Furthermore, the fund gives a dividend yield of 1%.