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Brother Ivan never opened TFSA. Websites beneath say his TFSA contribution room is $63 500, but screenshot from his CRA online account says $64 800.68! Why? Which's right?

Know your TFSA contribution limit - MoneySense

This current limit means someone who has never contributed to a TFSA and was old enough to have one since its inception will have a cumulative contribution room of $63,500 as of Jan. 1, 2019.

TFSA Limit By Year From 2009-2019

If you’re contributing in 2019 for the first time, you’re eligible to deposit $63,500 provided you’ve been over 18 years since 2009. If you’ve deposited some money over the years, just subtract that number from $63,500 to arrive at your maximum contribution.

How Much TFSA Contribution Room Do I Have (2009-2019)?

If you have never contributed to your TFSA and turned 18 in 2009 or before, you are allowed to contribute up to $63,500 in 2019.

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    If you follow the "View TFSA details" link, it dives into more information, including a year-by-year breakdown of what the contribution room was and how it was calculated. I do not have this situation (i.e. no contributions), so I cannot answer your question directly. The site should be able to shine some light, though.
    – Ian MacDonald
    Commented Aug 26, 2019 at 18:51

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I don't have the same situation as you, but accessing the TFSA details through the CRA website (following the link you see in your screenshot), I was able to drill down to this most recent year's contributions and see the line items they use to calculate the value.

I don't know 100% if this is true, but from the line items, it seems feasible that it would be possible to increase your own contribution limit for the next year by simply making money on any investments in your TFSA umbrella and withdrawing all of your funds.

CRA line items

For example, you could fill in the line items above with:

TFSA contribution room: $10,000
Minus contributions: $5,000
Equals unused room [$10,000 - $5,000]: $5,000

Plus withdrawals: $6,000
Plus new TFSA limit: $6,000
Equals new this year [$6,000 + $6,000]: $12,000

Total of [$5,000 + $12,000]: $17,000

So the claim that your brother never contributed may be inaccurate. Certainly, he may have a zero balance on his TFSA now, but if he contributed in the past and then withdrew all his funds (after making $1,300.68 profit), his contribution room would be as calculated by the government.

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