Tax Court litigation—or any other kind of litigation for that matter—is inherently unpredictable. Take Pigeau v. The Queen, 2009 TCC 582, for example. In that case, a key issue was the value of a property transferred from an individual to his grandfather. The taxpayer, who had the onus of proving value, showed up with nothing more than an MLS listing and a report that couldn’t be entered into evidence because the agent failed to give the proper notice. The Minister, on the other hand, had an expert’s appraisal in hand and the expert available to testify. The expert’s report was duly received, but the taxpayer still won, however, because the judge gave the benefit of the doubt to the taxpayer in choosing values from the ranges given by the expert. Which just goes to show you.
