Moving to Nevada Checklist: The 10 Steps for Californians, in Order

Buying a home in Las Vegas does not make you a Nevada resident, and selling a home in California does not end your relationship with the Franchise Tax Board. Both take deliberate steps, in a particular order. This is the list I work from with clients making the move, written as an attorney who is also the broker on the deal.

The 10 Steps at a Glance

1. Price the California sale and get pre-approved in Nevada in the same week, so both timelines are real.
2. Check the gain on the California home: the §121 exclusion, and the fact that your Prop 13 base does not travel. Details
3. Selling a rental? Plan the 1031 exchange before you list, including California’s annual Form FTB 3840. The 1031 guide
4. Set the move date with your CPA, before or after the California closing.
5. Sign the Nevada buyer-broker agreement, then write the offer, contingent on the California sale or bridged. The order
6. Close in Nevada and move the household in fact, not just the mailing address.
7. Within 30 days: Nevada driver’s licence, vehicle registration, and voter registration. Residency steps
8. Record a Declaration of Domicile and a Declaration of Homestead, and file the assessor’s primary-residence abatement affidavit. After closing
9. Move the professional and financial ties and keep a California day count.
10. File the part-year California return (540NR) the next spring, and keep filing for any California-source income. What California keeps taxing

Before You List the California Home

• Primary-residence exclusion. Federal law excludes up to $250,000 of gain ($500,000 married filing jointly) on a home you have owned and lived in for two of the last five years (IRC §121). California follows it. If you have rented the home out, or the gain is larger, the timing of the sale relative to the move can change the number.
• Your Prop 13 base does not travel. Proposition 19 lets qualifying California homeowners carry a low assessed value to another California home. It has no effect in Nevada. Your Las Vegas tax bill starts from Nevada’s own valuation of the new house.
• Selling a California rental instead. If the property you are selling is an investment and you plan a 1031 exchange into Nevada property, the exchange works federally, but California requires Form FTB 3840 every year until the deferred California gain is finally recognized. Miss a year and the FTB can assess the deferred tax as if you had sold. Put the annual filing on a calendar before you close. Choosing the Las Vegas replacement property, and the deadlines that drive it, is on the 1031 exchange page. My separate California law practice walks through the full timeline in a guide to the 1031 exchange from California to Las Vegas.
• California real-estate withholding. Escrow withholds 3⅓% of the sale price from a seller unless an exemption applies (Form 593). A principal residence usually qualifies for the exemption; a rental usually does not, and the withholding is reconciled on your California return.
• City transfer taxes. The county charge is $1.10 per $1,000, but cities such as Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose, Santa Monica and San Mateo add their own, and Los Angeles and San Francisco scale steeply above $5 million. Your county page carries the local rule: start with your county.

Establishing Nevada Residency

California decides residency by where your “closest connections” are, not by where you say you live, and it presumes anyone in the state more than nine months of the year is a resident. The FTB audits departures, and the audit is a review of the whole picture. Each item below is a piece of that picture.

• Move the home first, in fact. Your primary residence, your spouse and children, and the place you actually sleep most nights. A Las Vegas address on paper while the family stays in California does not survive an audit.
• Nevada driver’s licence and vehicle registration within 30 days of moving (Nevada DMV).
• Register to vote in Clark County and cancel the California registration.
• Record a Declaration of Domicile in Clark County (NRS 41.191). It is a one-page sworn statement, inexpensive to record, and it is the document a California auditor least expects a casual mover to have.
• Move the professional and financial ties. Doctors, dentists, accountant, bank branch, safe-deposit box, club memberships, church or temple. Each one is a “connection” in the FTB’s test.
• Count California days. Keep a calendar. Business trips back to California are fine; a pattern of half the year in California is not.
• File a part-year California return (Form 540NR) for the year of the move, and expect to keep filing a nonresident return for as long as you have California-source income.

What California Keeps Taxing After You Leave

Leaving does not end California tax on income that comes from California. The common ones for people making this move:

• Rent from a California property you keep, and the gain when you eventually sell it.
• Deferred gain from a 1031 exchange out of California property (the Form 3840 obligation above).
• Income from a California business or partnership, apportioned to California.
• Deferred compensation, stock options and restricted stock earned while working in California, to the extent they were earned there, even if they vest or are paid after you move.
• Community-property income where one spouse remains a California resident.

None of this is a reason not to move. It is a reason to know which income lines change and which do not before you assume a 13.3% saving on all of them.

After You Close in Nevada

• File the primary-residence abatement affidavit with the Clark County Assessor. It holds your property-tax increase to 3% a year instead of 8%. The assessor mails a postcard after closing; many buyers throw it away.
• Record a Declaration of Homestead (NRS 115). It protects up to $605,000 of equity from most creditors and costs a recording fee. It is separate from the tax abatement above; you want both.
• Real property transfer tax of $2.55 per $500 of price is paid at recording in Clark County, customarily by the seller, and is negotiated in the purchase agreement.
• No Nevada income tax, no Nevada estate or inheritance tax. Nevada’s Commerce Tax applies to businesses with more than $4 million of Nevada gross revenue, not to individuals.
• Update the estate plan. A California trust remains valid, but Nevada’s community-property rules, homestead and probate thresholds differ. Have it reviewed by a Nevada estate attorney within the first year. My separate California law practice explains how the vesting on your Nevada deed interacts with a California trust in taking title to a Las Vegas home from California.
• HOA and community rules that bind you from day one: rental caps, guest limits, and in some guard-gated golf communities a mandatory club membership. These are checked before the offer, on the buying page.

The Order to Do It In

Sequencing is where most of the money is saved or lost. The order I recommend for a client selling in California and buying in Nevada, with a few exceptions I would flag on your facts:

1. Get the California sale priced and the Nevada purchase pre-approved in the same week, so both timelines are real before either contract is signed.
2. Decide, with your CPA, whether the move date should fall before or after the California closing. For a primary residence it rarely matters. For a rental, an option exercise, or a large bonus, it can matter a great deal.
3. Sign the Nevada buyer-broker agreement, which Nevada requires in writing before a broker can show you property (Assembly Bill 258, effective October 1, 2025). What it says and how I am paid.
4. Write the Nevada offer contingent on the California sale if you need the proceeds to close, or bridge it if you do not. Contingent offers are accepted more often in Las Vegas than California sellers expect; I will tell you what the specific seller will bear.
5. Close Nevada, then move the residency items above in the first 30 days. Licence, registration, voter, domicile declaration, abatement affidavit, homestead.
6. File the part-year California return the following spring, with the day-count calendar attached to your CPA’s file.

Common Questions