As of December 22, 2025, the property profit surcharge, a new state tax applying a 3% rate to profits obtained from real estate activities, came into effect in the state of Morelos, as announced in the official newspaper Tierra y Libertad.
Notary Public No. 2, Hugo Salgado Castañeda, explained in an interview that this tax, already in effect in nine other states in the country (some with rates as high as 5%), primarily taxes two types of transactions:
1. Profit derived from the sale of real estate, payable by the seller.
2. The lease of real estate, payable by the lessor or owner who grants the use.
The tax is calculated on net profit, after applying the deductions authorized by federal tax law, and represents an additional source of revenue for the state government. According to specialists, the “cedular” tax is a levy applied specifically to a particular activity. In the case of Morelos, it is limited exclusively to the real estate sector, both in the sale and lease of properties.
Tax authorities and experts have emphasized that, although this is a novel concept for the state, it is not new at the national level, and its implementation seeks to strengthen state public finances by increasing revenue collection from the real estate sector. With this measure, Morelos joins the trend of several states that have opted to establish local cedular taxes on real estate activity as a strategy to increase their own revenue.
