Property registration costs in Nepal: malpot, kitta-kat, and the hidden Rs lakh on a Rs 1 crore plot

A friend bought a 4-aana plot in Tokha last Mangsir at Rs 1.2 crore. He had set aside "Rs 5–6 lakh for paperwork." The bill at Malpot was Rs 6.3 lakh: registration fee, surcharge, ward office letter, and lawyer. Then the seller's lawyer rang and asked who was covering the capital gains tax. Rs 2.6 lakh more, because they had held the land three years. Total transaction cost on a Rs 1.2 crore deal: Rs 8.9 lakh, or 7.4% of headline.

Most Nepali buyers and sellers go into a property transaction with a rough idea that "there will be some malpot fees." Few know the exact stack. Even fewer know how much of the seller's CGT ends up baked into the price the buyer pays, because both sides usually settle in the room and only one of them does the arithmetic.

What follows is the full fee stack at the Land Revenue Office in 2026, who pays what, and a Rs 1 crore worked example for Kathmandu Metropolitan.

The fee stack at Malpot

A property transaction in Nepal piles four distinct charges at the Malpot Karyalaya (Land Revenue Office):

Charge	Who pays	Rate (Kathmandu Metro)
Registration fee (malpot dastur)	Buyer	5% of declared transaction value
Bagmati Savyata Kosh	Buyer	5% of the registration fee
Capital gains tax (CGT)	Seller	7.5% if held ≤ 5 years; 5% if held > 5 years (on gain only)
Lawyer + ward letter + miscellaneous	Buyer mostly	Rs 5,000–25,000

There is no separate stamp duty in Nepal. The deed itself sits on stamp paper as a small fixed cost. The registration fee functions as both stamp duty and registration in one charge. Each line has its own exemptions and traps; the next sections take them in order.

Registration fee by municipal type

The federal Finance Act sets the registration fee by the type of local government the property sits in. The current schedule, in force since 2017 and confirmed for FY 2082/83:

Local government type	Rate
Metropolitan City (Kathmandu, Lalitpur, Pokhara, Biratnagar, etc.)	5%
Sub-Metropolitan City	4.5%
Municipality	4%
Rural Municipality (Gaupalika)	2%
Apartments (all areas)	1%
Group housing (all areas)	2%

Apartments are deliberately taxed lower to encourage vertical development. A Rs 1 crore apartment registers at Rs 1 lakh; a Rs 1 crore plot inside KMC registers at Rs 5 lakh. A 5x gap on the same headline price.

A 2017 rate hike lifted these from earlier rates of 4.5/4/2/2%, and the new schedule has stood since. Under the 2017 Local Government Operation Act, municipalities can layer their own additional charges, though most stick to the federal baseline.

Women-buyer concession. Properties registered in a woman's name get a 25% discount on the registration fee inside metro/sub-metro/municipality, and 30% in rural municipalities. On a Rs 1 crore KMC plot, that is Rs 1.25 lakh saved. The legal rationale and the property-rights backdrop sit in the women's property rights post.

The Bagmati Savyata Kosh surcharge

On top of the registration fee, properties inside Kathmandu, Lalitpur, and Bhaktapur districts pay a 5% Bagmati Savyata Kosh surcharge. This is 5% of the registration fee, not of the property value.

For a Rs 1 crore KMC plot:

• Registration fee: Rs 5,00,000
• Bagmati Savyata Kosh: Rs 25,000 (5% of Rs 5,00,000)
• Buyer-side dastur total: Rs 5,25,000

The surcharge funds urban-development projects across the Valley. It is mandatory, and the woman-buyer concession does not apply to it.

The minimum valuation rule

Malpot does not blindly accept the price the parties write on the deed. Every fiscal year, a district-level Minimum Price Determination Committee chaired by the Chief District Officer publishes a minimum valuation per aana for each ward, locality, and road type.

The Kathmandu Metropolitan minimum valuation for FY 2082/83 ranges from Rs 4 lakh per aana on outer wards to Rs 50 lakh per aana on the core commercial stretch (Durbar Marg, New Road, Hattisar, Maitighar, Kantipath). Lalitpur Kupandol sits around Rs 39.5 lakh per aana, Bhaktapur Araniko Highway frontage around Rs 35 lakh per aana.

How the tax actually gets calculated:

• If declared price ≥ minimum valuation: tax is on the declared price.
• If declared price < minimum valuation: tax is on the minimum valuation, and Malpot will not register a deed below this floor.
• If the same plot transacted at a higher price within recent history, Malpot will not accept a lower price for the next transaction. Past prices act as a one-way ratchet.

Government minimum valuations typically sit at 30–40% of market value. A Rs 1 crore plot in Tokha may have a minimum valuation of Rs 35–40 lakh on paper. That gap is exactly what creates the temptation to under-declare, covered below.

Capital gains tax (seller side)

Capital gains tax on real estate is the seller's bill, withheld at source by Malpot at deed registration. The current rates for individuals:

Holding period	CGT rate
≤ 5 years	7.5% on the gain
> 5 years	5% on the gain

The rules that matter on registration day:

• CGT applies only to transactions above Rs 10 lakh.
• The gain is selling price − (purchase price + allowable expenses). Allowable expenses include documented renovation, brokerage, and legal fees. Keep the receipts.
• A primary residence held 10+ years and sold for under Rs 10 lakh is fully exempt.
• Transfers to spouse, children, or by inheritance are exempt.
• For entities (companies, firms), the rate is materially higher, often 10–25% depending on structure and source cited.

The IRD treats this as the final tax on real-estate income, not advance tax. The seller does not file a separate ITR claiming the gain again. A deeper walkthrough of the math, the 5%/7.5% split, and the allowable-expense list sits in the capital gains tax on property post. The summary above is the part that hits the room on registration day.

The Rs 1 crore worked example

A buyer purchases a 4-aana plot in Tokha (KMC) for a declared Rs 1 crore. The seller bought it three years ago at Rs 70 lakh. The buyer is male. Holding period: 3 years (short-term).

Buyer side, at Malpot:

Item	Amount
Registration fee (5% of Rs 1 crore)	Rs 5,00,000
Bagmati Savyata Kosh (5% of registration fee)	Rs 25,000
Ward office recommendation letter	Rs 1,000
Lawyer / deed drafting	Rs 10,000
Buyer total	Rs 5,36,000

Seller side:

Item	Amount
Capital gain (Rs 1 crore − Rs 70 lakh − Rs 50,000 brokerage)	Rs 29,50,000
CGT at 7.5% (held < 5 years)	Rs 2,21,250
Seller total	Rs 2,21,250

Combined transaction cost: Rs 7,57,250, or 7.6% of headline price.

Three adjustments change the picture meaningfully:

• Held > 5 years. CGT drops to 5%, i.e. Rs 1,47,500. Combined cost falls to ~6.8%.
• Woman buyer. Registration fee gets a 25% discount, saving Rs 1,25,000. Combined cost falls to ~6.3%.
• Both. Combined cost lands at ~5.6%.

A Rs 1 crore property therefore costs Rs 1.05–1.08 crore to land in your name, before any broker commission (typically 1–2% of headline). Worth budgeting that gap separately from the headline the way you would budget for a wedding: the price you committed to is rarely the price you finish at.

Kitta-kat: subdividing the plot

If the deal involves splitting one parent kitta into multiple plots (common when buying half of a parent's land), the kitta-kat happens at the Survey Office (Napi Karyalaya), not Malpot.

Step	Cost / time
Application + government napi fee	Usually under Rs 5,000
Licensed surveyor fieldwork + map preparation	Rs 15,000–50,000 in Kathmandu
Higher precision (GNSS or drone survey)	2–3x the above
Total time	1 day fieldwork + 2–4 days office processing

The Mero Kitta online platform is live in 126 survey offices for map printing, plot information, and tax payment. Officials have 15 days to process applications, and downloaded maps expire after 7 days. The deed itself is still in-person at Malpot. End-to-end online registration is not live anywhere in Nepal yet.

The soft costs most buyers forget

Beyond the four headline charges, registration day involves:

• Ward office recommendation letter (Ghar Bato Sifaris): around Rs 1,000.
• Land tax clearance voucher (Tiro Rasid): nominal, but the seller must have paid annual land tax up to date.
• Char killa report (the boundary description).
• Rokka phukuwa (clearance from any encumbrance) before registration can proceed. This is a critical step: if the plot is mortgaged or under litigation, the rokka must lift first. The lalpurja checklist before bayana covers what to verify before any money changes hands.
• Two witnesses each side (no statutory fee; tip-based).
• Photocopies, photos, stamp paper, and bank voucher for the transaction amount.

These add up to Rs 5,000–15,000 of soft costs that nobody quotes upfront.

A new rule from 2025: licensed brokers above Rs 3 crore

A Gazette notice from Asoj 2082 requires any property transaction above Rs 3 crore in metros and sub-metros to be brokered through a licensed real-estate company. License fees: Rs 5 lakh for deals up to Rs 5 crore, Rs 10 lakh for above, valid five years. Unlicensed brokerage now carries up to Rs 25 lakh in fines and 6 months imprisonment.

Personal sales and mutual-agreement transactions between known parties remain exempt. The rule's main effect is formalising brokerage in the high-end Kathmandu market.

The under-declaration trap

Because the minimum valuation runs at 30–40% of market price, many parties agree to declare a value somewhere between the minimum and the actual price. This cuts both the buyer's registration fee and the seller's CGT.

It also exposes both sides to:

• 50% penalty on the evaded tax if caught.
• 100% penalty plus possible criminal prosecution for fraudulent declaration.
• Late-payment penalty 10–25% of the tax, plus 15% per annum interest, if registration is delayed.
• A future re-sale problem: Malpot will not accept a lower declared value than a previously registered one, locking the under-declaration in as the ceiling for the next transaction.

The savings on a Rs 1 crore deal are real (declaring Rs 50 lakh instead of Rs 1 crore saves the buyer about Rs 2.6 lakh in registration fees and the seller a similar amount in CGT), but the downside has grown sharper since Malpot started cross-checking with bank records, biometric citizenship records, and PAN-linked filings.

The 2026 market context

Real estate transactions nationwide dropped roughly 24% year-on-year by mid-FY 2082/83. Land-plotting has effectively halted since Shrawan 2082. Whether you are buying or selling, this is a slower market than 2022 or 2024, and slower markets give the buyer more leverage on both price and on who absorbs the registration costs.

Sellers in 2026 are quietly absorbing more of the buyer's stack to keep deals from collapsing. Three years ago a seller might have said "registration is your problem." Today they often share the malpot dastur to keep the deal alive.

Tracking it in Kharchapatra

A working setup if you are mid-transaction:

• Create a category called Property Purchase with sub-tags by line item (Property — Registration Fee, Property — Bagmati Kosh, Property — Lawyer, Property — CGT-Adjusted, Property — Ward, Property — Broker).
• Log every Malpot trip as a single transaction, even if multiple receipts are issued. The running total of "what this plot actually cost" should not need a calculator at year-end.
• If you negotiated the seller's CGT into the purchase price, log the CGT amount as a sub-line of the purchase price, not as a Malpot fee. It moves the optics on what you actually paid for the plot.
• After registration closes, lock the category and export it. Six years from now when you sell and need allowable-expense receipts for the next CGT calculation, you will not find the paperwork by hand.

What you actually need to know

Three takeaways from the math:

1. The headline price is not the landed price. Budget 6–8% of headline for a typical Kathmandu Metro transaction (5% registration + 0.25% Bagmati + part of the seller's CGT often absorbed by the buyer in price). For apartments, the floor drops to roughly 2–3%.
2. The woman-buyer 25% concession is large. On a Rs 1 crore plot, it saves Rs 1.25 lakh. If the family decision is open, registering in the wife's or daughter's name is the cheapest single intervention available at the Malpot counter.
3. Keep every receipt. Today's registration receipt is the input that lowers tomorrow's CGT. The seller who lost the Rs 70 lakh original receipt pays CGT on Rs 1 crore minus the historical minimum valuation, not on the Rs 30 lakh real gain.

Doing a deal outside the Valley? The 4%/2% schedule applies and there is no Bagmati Savyata Kosh. Otherwise the structure holds.

Got a specific transaction profile and want to think through who pays what at registration? Email parjanya57@gmail.com.

This post is part of the Nepal Money Basics guide — the big-ticket decisions section.