Estate-liquidity calculator
Would your estate have
the cash it needs?
Explore how the funds available to your estate compare with its estimated obligations and identify questions that need closer attention.
This tool does not calculate estate duty, capital gains tax or executor fees. Enter an estimated range of other cash demands, excluding the debts entered separately. Ownership, beneficiaries and timing need professional verification.
Illustrative assumptions
A worked example.
- Gross assets
- R8.5m
- Immediately available
- R350k
- Estimated obligations
- R1.35mto R1.6m
- Immediate cash gap
- R1mto R1.25m
On these illustrative assumptions, R350,000 of immediate funds leaves a gap of R1 million–R1.25 million against total obligations of R1.35 million–R1.6 million, before considering later realisations. The obligations are an assumed total; no fees or taxes have been calculated.
Build a cash-shortfall snapshot.
Use estimated rand amounts. Optional blank asset and liquidity fields count as zero; both demand estimates are required.
Potentially realisable funds and asset context
These are different views. Gross assets show estate size; they do not automatically provide cash. Potentially realisable funds exclude the immediate amounts already entered.
Complexity and uncertainty
These responses identify matters needing review. They do not calculate spouse relief, divide assets automatically or establish ownership.
Your estate-liquidity snapshot
Select your assumptions, then calculate.
This snapshot compares aggregate amounts. ‘Immediate’ and ‘later’ reflect your assumptions about availability. The calculator does not schedule payment or receipt dates or determine whether a bill can be paid when due.
How to read the result
Timing matters
as much as value.
Total cash demand equals debts plus your other-demand estimate. The immediate position is the available immediate funds less that demand. The potential later position adds amounts you believe could be realised subsequently.
An estate can have substantial assets and still need cash before those assets can be sold. Policy proceeds paid directly to a beneficiary may not be available to the estate. The calculator does not infer asset ownership, marital-property consequences, trust claims or tax treatment.
A result can indicate a potential gap, no immediate gap on the entered assumptions, or that more information is needed. An uncertain or complex response remains material even if the arithmetic appears to show a surplus.
Read how estate liquidity works in South Africa.
Reference framework: SARS estate duty and administration of estates regulations. The calculation uses your entered cost estimates; it does not apply tax tables automatically.
Understand what your estate’s cash position means for your wider financial plan.
A Financial Clarity Review can help identify the questions to take to the appropriate legal, tax or fiduciary specialist. We agree the scope and once-off fee before work begins.
Explore the Financial Clarity Review