balipropertyguideBuying in Bali by area: the part that genuinely differs
Most “property in [area]” pages are the same page with the place name changed. There is one thing that really does change from village to village, and almost nobody writes it down.
Bali is not one jurisdiction for tax
The rules about what a foreigner may hold are national and identical across Indonesia. The numbers are not.
Law 1/2022 sets ceilings and then hands the operative figures to regional by-law in three separate places: article 47(2) for the acquisition duty rate, article 46(8) for the tax-free acquisition value, and article 41(3) for the annual land and building tax rate. The regional governments that make those by-laws are the regencies and the city — and Bali has nine of them.
So a villa in Canggu and a villa in Ubud are taxed under different instruments made by different legislatures. The four areas below sit in 3 of them: Kabupaten Badung, Kabupaten Gianyar, Kota Denpasar. A rate someone quoted you as “the Bali rate” is, at best, one regency’s.
We do not publish a rate for any of them. We read the national statutes in the Indonesian original and we can show you those. We did not obtain the individual by-laws, so we name the body that makes the number and tell you we have not read it. Every other Bali site prints a single national figure. Why we would rather not.
The four areas, and what each one is really about
These were chosen because each leads on a different article, not because they are the four largest markets. A page about Seminyak that repeated the Canggu page would be worth nothing to anybody.
Canggu
Kabupaten Badung. The highest-volume foreign purchase market on the island, and the one where land designation questions arise most often.
Ubud
Kabupaten Gianyar. A different regional government from the coastal markets, and a land pattern shaped by river gorges, village land and cultural designation.
Uluwatu
Kabupaten Badung. Larger plots on the Bukit limestone plateau, which is where the 2,000 square meter cap on a foreigner's home stops being theoretical.
Sanur
Kota Denpasar. Inside the city rather than a regency, with more strata stock than anywhere else on this list — which opens a route the other areas do not have.
What is the same everywhere
Almost all of it, and it is worth being explicit about that so the pages above are read for what they are. The rights a foreigner may hold, the terms attached to them, the conversion on purchase, the article 186 limits, the nominee prohibition and the transaction sequence are national. None of them changes when you cross a regency boundary.
- What a foreigner can actually own — the listing vocabulary resolved against the statute.
- The three routes — leasehold, hak pakai and PT PMA — and how to choose between them.
- The ten failures, in the order they arrive.
- What each document can and cannot prove.
- What the remaining term costs you per year of use.
Read those first. The area pages are the layer on top.
The nine, and where the property markets sit in them
For completeness, because it is the table that makes the point concrete. Bali is one province containing eight regencies and one city, each with its own legislature. Every one of them sets its own acquisition duty rate, its own tax-free acquisition value and its own annual land tax rate, under the delegations above.
| Regional government | Seat | Property markets a foreign buyer is likely to meet |
|---|---|---|
| Kabupaten Badung | Mangupura | Canggu, Seminyak, Kuta, Uluwatu, Nusa Dua |
| Kabupaten Gianyar | Gianyar | Ubud, Tegallalang, Sukawati |
| Kota Denpasar | Denpasar | Sanur, Renon, central Denpasar |
| Kabupaten Tabanan | Tabanan | Tanah Lot, Selemadeg, Bedugul |
| Kabupaten Buleleng | Singaraja | Lovina, Singaraja, the north coast |
| Kabupaten Karangasem | Amlapura | Amed, Candidasa, Sidemen |
| Kabupaten Klungkung | Semarapura | Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan |
| Kabupaten Bangli | Bangli | Kintamani, Lake Batur |
| Kabupaten Jembrana | Negara | Medewi, the west coast |
Administrative structure, not law. No rate is shown in this table because a rate belongs next to its instrument; the two by-laws we have read are set out below.
Why the delegation matters more than it sounds
It would be reasonable to read all of this as a technicality. Three reasons it is not.
It changes the number, not just the source of the number. A ceiling of 5% is not a rate of 5%. The by-law can set anything up to it, and the tax-free acquisition value it sets as a deduction can be anything at or above the national floor of IDR 80 million. Two purchases at identical prices in different regencies can produce genuinely different bills.
By-laws change more often than the national statutes do. The framework this site quotes — the Basic Agrarian Law of 1960, PP 18/2021, Law 1/2022 — moves rarely. Regional tax by-laws move on a local political cycle. Anything you read about Bali tax rates ages faster than anything you read about Bali land rights, which is a good reason to treat a rate you found online as a prompt to ask rather than an answer.
It tells you who to ask. This is the practical value. “What is the BPHTB rate in Bali?” has no answer. “What rate and what NPOPTKP has Badung set, and under which by-law?” is a question a local tax adviser or notary can answer in one email, and asking it in that form is itself a signal that you know what you are doing.
Two of nine by-laws read, and what they say
Publishing a rate needs the by-law for that regional government, read in Indonesian, with its amendments, confirmed as in force. The national legal database we obtained every other source from does not carry the regional tax by-laws, so in September 2026 we went to each region’s own legal database. Two yielded the text; two did not.
| Regional government | Tax by-law | Status on this site |
|---|---|---|
| Kota Denpasar (Sanur) | Perda 5/2023, amended by Perda 2/2025 | Read. BPHTB 5%, PBB-P2 0.1% on NJOP up to IDR 1 billion, 0.2% above itDenpasar Perda 5/2023 art. 8(1) |
| Kabupaten Tabanan | Perda 13/2023 | Read. BPHTB 5%, PBB-P2 0.1% on NJOP up to IDR 1 billion, 0.2% above itTabanan Perda 13/2023 art. 8(1) |
| Kabupaten Badung (Canggu, Seminyak, Uluwatu) | Not obtained — its legal database did not respond | Ceilings only. Its spatial plan (Perda 4/2025) was read.Badung Perda 4/2025 art. 92(2)(e) |
| Kabupaten Gianyar (Ubud) | Perda 7/2023, listed but the record errors on the regency’s server | Ceilings only. Its spatial plan (Perda 2/2023) was read.Gianyar Perda 2/2023, elucidation to art. 71(9) |
| The other five | Not searched this round | Ceilings onlyOur analysis — no regulation sets this |
The two we read agree with each other on an ordinary purchase — 5% acquisition duty after a tax-free IDR 80 million — and differ on inheritance and on the annual tax’s tax-free value. The annual tax, side by side. The 10% tax on letting. What Badung’s spatial plan allows, zone by zone.
The rest remain a gap and we are naming it as one rather than filling it with a national average. If you obtain any of them, write to us with the instrument and we will publish the figure with the citation attached. The rule we apply to gaps like this one.
Ask about a specific property
Five questions. Your details are the last step, never the first.
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Here is what happens after you submit:
- Your answers go to businesses that advertise for Bali purchases.
- No more than three of them may contact you, using the details you gave.
- You decide who, if anyone, you reply to. You are committed to nothing.
We are not an agency, a notary or a law firm, and we do not rank or recommend anyone. Sending this creates no professional relationship.
Questions about area and jurisdiction
Does the area I buy in change the law?
Not the national law, which is the same across Indonesia. It changes the by-laws that set the actual numbers. Law 1/2022 caps acquisition duty at 5% and hands the rate to regional by-law at article 47(2); it does the same for the tax-free threshold at article 46(8) and for the annual land tax rate at article 41(3). Bali has nine regional governments, so there is no single Bali rate to quote.
Why do you not publish the rate for each regency?
Because we have not read each regency's by-law. We read the national statutes in the Indonesian original and we can show you those; we did not obtain Badung's, Gianyar's or Denpasar's instruments, so we name the body that sets the number and say we have not read it. That is less satisfying than a table and it is the difference between citing a source and guessing.
Which areas do you cover?
Four, chosen because each one leads on a genuinely different legal question rather than because they are the four biggest markets. Canggu is about land designation, Ubud about consents, Uluwatu about the 2,000 square meter cap, and Sanur about strata title. Adding eight more pages that all said the same thing would not help anyone.
Is one area legally safer than another?
No area is safer as a matter of law. What differs is which question is most likely to be the one that goes wrong, which is a function of the land history and the kind of stock on offer rather than of any local rule.
Do you have listings for these areas?
No. We hold no listings anywhere and we are not an agency. These pages exist to tell you what to check in each market, not to sell you anything in it.
Sources cited on this page
- Law 1/2022 (HKPD) arts. 41(3), 46(8), 47(2) — rates set by regional by-law
- Permen ATR/BPN 18/2021 art. 186 — limits on a foreigner’s home
Every rule above was read in the Indonesian original on 20 September 2026, not from an English summary. How we check this.