Stamp duty by state, 2026: the rates we could verify, and how women's concessions really apply

Rules and rates as of 12 October 2026.

Stamp duty is usually the largest cash cost of buying a home that a loan does not cover. It is set by each state, it changes by notification rather than by budget headline, and the women's concessions that get quoted everywhere come with conditions that decide whether a particular purchase qualifies. This explainer sets out what we could confirm on official state portals, flags plainly what we could not, and works through a ₹1.2 crore purchase. It is meant to sit next to our stamp duty calculator, so the table only shows a rate where we read it on a government page.

The three moving parts

Stamp duty is a state tax on the sale deed (and, in some states, on the agreement for sale). Registration fee is a separate charge for entering the deed in the sub-registrar's records. Some states add a third levy on top: Telangana, for instance, charges a separate transfer duty, and Delhi's revenue department describes its rate as "stamp duty and transfer duty" together.

The base is the other half of the sum. Delhi's revenue department says duty and registration fee are charged on the consideration or the circle-rate value, whichever is higher. Telangana's registration department lists its chargeable value as "market value (or) consideration whichever is higher". So a flat bought below the government valuation is still taxed on the government valuation. Treat that as the general pattern, but check the wording of your own state's rule.

State by state: what we could verify

"Unverified" does not mean the commonly quoted rate is wrong. It means we could not read it on an official page on the day of writing, and we do not fill a rate from a property portal or a bank's blog. For those six states, the figure to rely on is the one the sub-registrar's system computes on your actual document.

How the women's concessions actually apply

Delhi

Delhi's revenue department pages state the rate by the gender of the vendee: 4% for a woman, 6% for a man, on the higher of consideration or circle-rate value. The pages do not say how a purchase by a husband and wife together is charged. Joint-buyer rates are widely quoted elsewhere, but we could not find one on the department's own pages, so confirm with the sub-registrar before you budget for it.

Maharashtra

A Revenue and Forest Department order dated 31 March 2021, issued under section 9(a) of the Maharashtra Stamp Act, 1958, reduced duty under Article 25(b) by one percentage point from 1 April 2021. It applies to conveyances and agreements to sell any residential unit (flat, bungalow, row house and so on) where a woman or women are the only purchasers. A man on the title, even as a joint owner, takes the purchase out of the order. The order gave no refund where duty had already been paid. As originally issued, it also barred the woman from selling the unit to a male buyer within 15 years, on pain of paying the remitted duty plus penalty.

That last condition is the one to check most carefully. Several property publications report that the state removed the 15-year restriction in 2023. We could not read an amending order on a government site, so we cannot confirm whether the restriction still applies to purchases made under the 2021 order, or from what date it stopped applying. Ask your lawyer to show you the current order before you rely on either version. We also could not confirm Maharashtra's base rate on an official page, or the 1% metro cess that applies in some urban areas, so we have not used Maharashtra in the example below.

Telangana

The registration department's ready reckoner lists no separate women's rate for sale deeds. It cites G.O.Ms.No.59 of 20 July 2021 for stamp duty. A couple and a woman buying alone pay the same.

Worked example: a ₹1.2 crore flat

Assume a ₹1.2 crore agreement value that is at or above the circle-rate or market value, so the agreement value is the base. Formula: charge = base × rate. Our arithmetic is below. Registration fees are as listed; any upper limits a state places on them are not applied here.

In Delhi the gap between a woman alone and a man alone is ₹2,40,000 (2% of ₹1.2 crore). The registration fee does not change. In Telangana, who signs as buyer makes no difference to the outlay.

Now change one assumption. If the Delhi circle-rate value of the same flat were ₹1.3 crore, a woman buying alone would pay 4% of ₹1.3 crore, which is ₹5,20,000, plus ₹1,30,100 registration fee: ₹6,50,100 in all. That is ₹50,000 more than the agreement price alone suggests.

What a concession does not change

Putting a home in one name changes more than stamp duty. It decides who owns it, who can later transfer it, whose income the rent or capital gain is taxed in, and who can claim home-loan interest. A lender may still want the other spouse as a co-borrower, and co-borrowing does not make that person an owner. These questions belong with a lawyer and a chartered accountant before you fill in the sale deed. A saving of ₹2.4 lakh at registration is not, on its own, a reason to arrange ownership differently from what you actually intend.

Duty can also be due at the agreement stage. Maharashtra's 2021 order covers agreements to sell as well as conveyances, and Telangana's ready reckoner lists a "sale agreement with possession" at 5.5% stamp duty, adjustable against the sale deed. On an under-construction flat, ask the developer's legal team when duty will be paid and on which document.