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How to use the Property Sale CGT calculator
The Property Sale CGT calculator works out the capital gains tax on a property you are selling. It takes about a minute. The answer is only as good as a few inputs people routinely get wrong, so here is how to drive it.
The calculator answers one question. If you sell this property, what will SARS take in capital gains tax? It treats a primary residence and an investment property very differently, because the law does, and that one setting changes the answer more than anything else you enter.
What you'll need
Have these to hand before you start:
- The sale price, and your selling costs. Estate agent commission is the big one.
- The original purchase price, and what you paid buying it: transfer duty and conveyancing fees.
- What you spent on capital improvements over the years. A new roof or an added room counts. Repainting and repairs do not.
- Your taxable income for the year of the sale, because the gain is taxed at your rate.
- Whether you owned it alone or with someone, and whether it was your home or an investment.
How to use it
Start with the setting that matters most: was this your primary residence, the home you actually lived in, or an investment property? Get this right first. A primary home carries a R3 million exclusion that an investment property does not.
Enter the sale and purchase figures next, and put your real buying and selling costs in rather than leaving them at zero. Blank costs overstate the gain, which overstates the tax. Add your improvements, sticking to the capital ones.
Set your income and the number of owners. Joint owners split the gain, and each gets their own exclusions and their own rate, which usually pulls the total down.
Reading your result
The headline figure is the capital gains tax owed. Under it the calculator shows the working: your gross gain, the primary-residence exclusion applied, the annual R50,000 exclusion, the taxable portion, and the tax itself. If the tax lands at zero on your home, that is the R3 million exclusion doing its job, not a glitch.
A worked example
Take an investment flat sold for a R750,000 gain, owned by someone earning R600,000 a year. After the R50,000 annual exclusion, R700,000 is taxable. At the 40% inclusion rate and that person's marginal rate, the tax comes to about R106,326. The same R750,000 gain on a primary residence is zero, because it sits well under the R3 million exclusion. Same profit, very different bill, decided by the toggle at the top.
What it does not do
The calculator assumes an individual under 65. Trusts and companies are taxed on different rules and it does not model them. It also cannot see your whole tax year, so treat a large gain as an estimate and confirm it.
For the rules behind the numbers, including the R3 million change that took effect on 1 March 2026, read Property CGT after the R3 million change. When you are ready, open the Property Sale CGT calculator and run your own sale.
Money Cat is an information tool, not tax or legal advice. Figures use the 2026/27 SARS rules for an individual under 65. Confirm your result with a registered tax practitioner or SARS.