How do I pay less tax?

PJ Botha • January 17, 2025

"The only things that hurts more than paying an income tax is not having to pay an income tax." Dewar, Thomas.

 

This quote is undoubtedly optimistic, but it also contains some truth. Tax payment is both a luxury and a hardship. Although you must pay taxes of some kind, there are ways to lessen your tax liability.

 

It's critical to distinguish between tax avoidance and tax evasion before we begin. It goes without saying that tax avoidance is against the law and unacceptable. Tax avoidance from an investing standpoint refers to avoiding paying needless taxes as a result of poor investment planning.

 

As February, the end of the financial year, is drawing near, now is the great time to assess your existing financial status and make the most of the tax benefits available to you.

 

 

There are the following choices:

 

Retirement Annuities

 

Retirement Annuities (RAs) are among the best options for tax planning. You can take advantage of the following noteworthy tax advantages: Your voluntary donations to a RA are tax deductible up to 27.5% of your taxable income, or R350 000. This is known as an individual's tax benefit. This implies that the money you save in a RA may be taken into account when calculating your income tax and subtracted from the amount of tax due to SARS.

 

For the duration of the investment, there are no applicable income, capital gains, or dividend taxes.

Depending on prior lump sum withdrawals, up to R550 000 of your lump sum payout may be tax-free upon retirement. The remaining amount is thereafter subject to taxation at the rates specified in the retirement lump sum tax table.

Neither a living annuity nor a RA are subject to estate duty.

Lump amounts received by beneficiaries upon the death of a RA investor are free from estate duty (with the exception of contributions that are prohibited).

 

Tax-free savings

 

Different to a RA, the contributions to a tax-free savings account are made from post-tax income and you don’t get the tax benefit on contributions.

 

However, you are free to take your money out whenever you choose. An excellent approach to supplement your retirement funds or save for a long-term objective, such as your children's university fees.

 

During the investment period, no income, capital gains, or dividend taxes are due, just like with a RA.

 

Remember that you have a lifetime contribution cap of R500 000 and an annual contribution cap of R36 000 (or R3 000 per month) for all of your tax-free savings accounts from all providers.

 

Additional tax tactics you may use include:

 

Tax loss harvesting: 

This tactic involves selling some financial assets at a loss to lower your tax obligation at the end of the year. You can use tax loss harvesting to offset capital gains that result from selling other investments or assets at a profit.

 

Utilise your exemptions: 

You are eligible for a R 40,000 annual capital gains exemption. Perhaps it's time to move across investment funds or take a profit on a well-executed investment.

You can also take advantage of an interest exemption for R 23 800 (R 34 500 for individuals over 65). Your investment plan may need to be reevaluated if your interest exceeds that amount.

 

Donations: You are exempt from donation tax if you donate R100,000 annually. To lower your estate for estate duty reasons, now is an excellent moment to give R 100,000 to a family trust or your kids.

You will also receive a deduction for your donation if it is made to a charity that has Section 18A approval.

 

The aforementioned can undoubtedly lessen the tax burden, but it won't eliminate it. Paying your fair amount of taxes is important, but you shouldn't pay more than is necessary.

PJ Botha

Restructure Your Cash for Better Estate Planning

By Ruvan J Grobler • May 5, 2026
You can build significant wealth and still leave your family with a mess. Not because you didn’t plan—but because your cash wasn’t structured correctly. Too much liquidity in the wrong place, fragmented accounts, or misaligned ownership can quietly undermine even the most carefully drafted estate plan. Without intention, even a well-built estate can become complicated, delayed, or unnecessarily taxed. Estate planning isn’t just about documents and wills. It’s about how your money actually flows—and whether that flow supports or disrupts the legacy you intend to leave. Where do Money Market/Fixed Deposits/Savings Accounts fit into your portfolio? Financial Planning Cashflow These short-term conservatively positioned assets, just like all conventional asset classes, have a specific place in financial planning. It can be aligned with short-term investment goals where liquidity is key and can also form part of emergency savings. It’s important to note that interest earnings are taxed as income and can create unexpected tax liabilities. Risk Aversion Not all investors feel the same about risk, and that’s ok. Some might argue the price of holding cash in the long-term, but the investor has peace of mind that there will never be any surprises when opening investment statements, although it may come at the price of inflation beating growth over the long term. Implications on death by not holding the cash investment in a structure: Tax: The capital will form part of the dutiable estate for purposes of calculating the estate duty payable to SARS. 20% levied on dutiable estate between R3.5 million and R30 million, 25% levied on dutiable estate exceeding R30 million. Executor’s fees: The capital will form part of the calculation of executor’s fees charged by the executor of the estate. 4% (Incl. VAT) is the general fee charged by executors. Liquidity: In normal circumstances, the capital will only be available to beneficiaries once the Master of the High Court has accepted the L&D account and there is sufficient liquidity to make distributions. How do we solve this? It’s important to make sure that if you hold cash investments that it not only follows your financial planning goals, but the structure is considered too. Wrapping the assets in a structure solves two of the above issues, no executor’s fees can be charged if a cash investment moves directly from the deceased to the beneficiary via a nomination, and this process also provides liquidity to beneficiaries significantly faster than if it formed part of the estate for distribution purposes. Some structures may have liquidity constraints before death making it important to consider multiple structures to make sure your financial planning goals can be funded. Another major benefit of a wrapped structure is the deferral of tax liability as the structure will be taxed and not the individual. This income tax liability is taxed at a flat 30% and paid to SARS by the product provider. It may also be a good idea to look at who actually owns the cash investment. Moving it to your business or trust can also come with positive estate planning fundamentals. Reach out to me at ruvan@bovest.co.za to look at estate planning friendly structures for your cash investments. Ruvan J Grobler RFP™ (PGDip Financial Planning)

How does checking your investment regularly impact your investment goals?

By Francois le Clus • May 4, 2026
Whether we like it or not, we are emotionally attached to our finances, especially our investments. I understand this because I also fall into this trap, even though I’m a financial professional. March was not a fun month for me or just about any investor in the world. We saw significant downward movements in markets across the globe, and there was nowhere to hide except cash. It also didn’t help that I checked regularly on my portfolio’s performance. I was shocked, even though I knew it was bad, but I found solace in the fact that markets will recover again, and this was short-term. The funny thing was that my portfolio was still up year-to-date, and I was still up, but I anchored the investment value and saw the past month’s investment performance as a loss, but I was still in the money. I fell into two traps. I anchored a number, and I had given in to myopic loss aversion. What Myopic loss aversion? Simply put, Investors feel losses more strongly than gains (loss aversion). This led me to experience anxiety and consider making a change to my portfolio’s. (Luckily I didn’t). This led my into doing some more research into markets and how they behave on a daily, monthly, quarterly, and yearly basis. I was quite shocked by the data and how I could potentially sabotage my portfolio. When looking at the S&P 500 and the JSE, you can see data that is very closely correlated with each other. When looking at the daily performance of the indices over the past 15 years, you would see that the S&P 500 had positive 53% of trading days and negative 47%. When looking at the JSE on a daily basis, you would see 51% to 53% positive days and 47% to 49% negative days. Even in strong bull markets, almost half of all days are negative. Returns are driven by a relatively small number of strong up days. When looking at monthly performance, the S&P had 60%–65% positive months vs 35%-40% negative months. The JSE had 56% positive months vs 44% negative months. You can already start to see how the data is moving in a more positive direction. When looking at quarterly performance, the picture becomes even better. The S&P delivered Positive quarters between 65%–70% and negative quarters between 30%-35%. When looking at the JSE, it delivered positive quarters between 55%–65% and negative quarters between 35%-40%. When looking at the yearly performance, the S&P delivered 75%-80% positive months vs 25%-30% negative returns. The JSE delivered 60%-70% positive years vs 40%-30% negative years. Losses at the yearly level are relatively infrequent but can be sharp. The pattern becomes very clear: The longer the timeframe, the higher the probability of a positive return. Short-term volatility is normal and persistent. Long-term returns are driven by compounding and upward drift. Practical interpretation (important) Volatility is constant. Even in strong years, many days and months are negative. This is why timing the market is extremely difficult. Time horizon is everything - Daily investing feels like a coin flip. - Long-term investing becomes probability in your favour. Best days matter disproportionately Missing a handful of strong positive days can materially reduce returns. Side-by-side summary