Moving from Vancouver to Seattle: Taxes, RSUs, and the Tech Corridor

Vancouver to Seattle is the busiest tech-specific corridor between Canada and the US. Amazon, Microsoft, SAP, EA, and a long list of game studios and VFX houses pull engineers, designers, and producers out of Vancouver every year, and the move covers 140 miles, one time zone, and a completely different tax system. The BC-to-Washington guide covers the province-level mechanics. This one covers what’s specific to the Vancouver-Seattle version of that move: the RSU patterns at the big employers, the TN pipeline, and the fact that a lot of people don’t fully leave Vancouver behind.

How different are the two tax systems?

The headline number people fixate on is the income tax disappearing. That’s real, but it’s not the whole picture once you add sales tax, property tax, and the capital gains excise into the comparison.

Tax	Vancouver / BC	Seattle / Washington
Personal income tax	Combined federal + BC top rate ~53.5%	None
Capital gains	50%/66.67% inclusion rate, taxed as income	7% excise above $262,000/year on long-term gains
Sales tax	12% (5% GST + 7% PST)	~10.25% combined state and local
Property tax	Roughly 0.3% to 0.5% of assessed value	King County averages close to 1%
City income tax	None	None
Business tax	Corporate income tax	Seattle B&O tax on gross receipts (in addition to state B&O)

What happens to my BC tax bill on the way out?

Leaving BC triggers the same departure tax as any other exit: a deemed disposition of your worldwide property at fair market value on your departure date, reported on the final BC return. If you’re holding unvested options, RSUs already granted, or a non-registered brokerage account with real gains, this is where the bill shows up, not later. BC’s rates climb to 20.5% provincial on income above roughly $252,752, stacked on top of the federal brackets to get to that ~53.5% combined figure. The full departure checklist walks through the return, the T1243, and the elections available to manage the hit.

How do tech RSUs interact with the excise tax?

This is the part that’s unique to this corridor. Amazon and Microsoft both vest RSUs on multi-year schedules (Amazon’s are famously back-loaded, Microsoft’s are more even), and a single vest year at senior levels can easily push $262,000 in long-term gains once shares are sold. The wrinkle: Washington’s excise tax applies to the gain on sale, not the value at vesting, so it only bites if you hold shares past vesting and they appreciate before you sell. Sell-to-cover at vest generally avoids it. Holding a concentrated position and selling it later, especially after a run-up, is where the threshold gets crossed.

What visa gets most people across?

TN status is the dominant pathway for this corridor. Computer systems analyst is the most commonly used TN category for software engineers, and it renews indefinitely in one-year (or up to three-year) increments as long as the job qualifies. H-1B shows up too, especially at Microsoft and Amazon for roles that don’t map cleanly to a TN category, or when someone’s already in the H-1B lottery pipeline from an internship. The TN-specific RRSP and TFSA guide covers what to do with Canadian accounts before the visa start date, and it applies just as much to an H-1B move.

Why does the 2.5-hour drive change the planning?

Most cross-border moves put real distance and a time zone shift between the old life and the new one. This one doesn’t. Same time zone, a short flight or a manageable drive, and enough people making the same move that whole social circles just relocate together. The practical effect: a lot of Vancouver transplants don’t sell the condo. They rent it out, or keep it as a landing pad for family visits, which is convenient right up until it complicates the tax picture. A rented-out Vancouver property means ongoing Canadian non-resident filing (Section 216), and if you eventually sell it, the principal residence exemption only covers the years you actually lived there, prorated against the years it was a rental after you left.

What if I keep a place in Vancouver?

Maintaining a dwelling in Canada is one of the factors the CRA weighs when deciding whether you’ve actually severed residential ties, alongside a spouse or dependents staying behind, provincial health coverage, and Canadian bank accounts or memberships. Keeping the condo doesn’t automatically make you a resident for tax purposes, but it’s a fact pattern worth documenting deliberately (lease agreement, changed mailing address, MSP cancellation) rather than leaving ambiguous. BC’s Medical Services Plan coverage runs until the end of the following month after you leave, and after that you need Washington-side coverage through an employer plan, which both Amazon and Microsoft offer from day one.

Where do people actually end up living?

Bellevue and Redmond are the default landing spots, both close to Microsoft’s Redmond campus and a reasonable commute to Amazon’s Seattle headquarters. Kirkland pulls people who want lake access and a shorter drive to Google’s and Meta’s Kirkland offices. Bothell has become a landing zone for people who want lower housing costs and don’t mind a longer commute, and for Microsoft employees whose team sits closer to the north campus. None of these carry a city income tax, and none of them change the state-level analysis above, but property tax rates and school district assessments do vary by city within King County.

Does Seattle tax businesses differently than the state does?

Yes. On top of Washington’s state B&O tax, Seattle levies its own city B&O tax on gross receipts from business activity within city limits. This matters if you’re consulting on the side, running an LLC, or keeping a Canadian corporation active after the move (which then raises its own Form 5471 and GILTI questions on the US federal return). It doesn’t apply to a straight W-2 salary from Amazon or Microsoft.

What should I actually do before the move?

Get the BC departure return scoped before you leave, not after, so unvested equity and any brokerage gains are handled deliberately rather than discovered at filing time. Decide what happens to the condo and put it in writing. Line up US health coverage for the gap between MSP ending and your new employer’s plan starting. And if you’re sitting on RSUs that are likely to vest into real money in your first year or two, map out the sale timing against the $262,000 threshold before the shares hit your account, not after.

• BC to Washington state taxes, the province-level version of this corridor
• BC to California taxes, the comparison corridor where RRSPs get taxed annually
• BC to Texas taxes, the other no-income-tax option from BC
• Canada to Washington taxes, the generic version from any province
• Ontario to Washington state taxes, the same destination from a different origin
• Canadian departure tax basics, the T1161/T1243 filing mechanics
• Departure checklist, the full exit sequence
• RRSP and TFSA on a TN move, what to do with Canadian accounts before you go
• The US-Canada tax treaty explained, the framework behind most of this
• Your first US tax return, what filing looks like in year one
• Provincial health insurance timing, the MSP coverage tail
• State income tax for cross-border filers, the general state-by-state picture
• Vancouver to San Francisco, the RRSP-addback corridor from BC
• Vancouver to Los Angeles, the VFX and entertainment corridor from BC
• Vancouver to Denver, the outdoor-lifestyle tech corridor from BC
• Vancouver to Austin, the no-income-tax tech corridor from BC
• Vancouver to Portland, the I-5 corridor south with no sales tax
• Calgary to Seattle, the energy-to-tech sibling corridor
• Toronto to Seattle, the tech corridor from Ontario
• Vancouver to New York, the film and finance corridor into NYC

This guide is general information, not tax advice for your specific situation. Which points apply, and how, depends on your facts.