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TORONTO — For decades, Barry Lebow has kept a scrapbook of one of the most traumatic business days in life.

There are some dates you always remember, and for the Ontario real estate industry it’s April 9, 1974. That is the day the province shocked the sector by announcing a 50 per cent land speculation tax.

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“We had no wind of this,” said Lebow, now 69, and still a Toronto realtor. “I was 27 years old and I owned 53 houses the day (speculation tax) came in.

“We were the largest home buyers in Toronto, my (financial) partners and myself. I went to bed a millionaire and woke up owing about $1.5 million the next morning.”

The governing Conservatives under Premier William Davis imposed a provincial tax, fully independent of any federal capital gains tax, which allowed for a 50 per cent tax on any land profits. Principal residences and family-owned farm lands were exempt.