PRIVATE WEALTH
WHEN
GOOD PRODUCTS
MAKE A
BAD PLAN
This year’ s expanded tax allowances create valuable opportunities, but only when considered as part of a complete financial plan.
A
financial loss that never appears on a statement, says Pedri Reyneke, CEO of Multilink Financial Services, is an allowance that was available but never used.
From March, several South African tax-free and deductible investment limits increased, benefiting retirement savings, investments, donations and estates.
None of it is paid out. Each one is an allowance, and an allowance is only collected by somebody who knows the shape of the balance sheet it is being claimed against.
“ Nothing on that list arrives in your account,” Reyneke says.“ It has to be claimed, and it can only be claimed against a structure somebody has actually looked at.”
There is no standard structure, because there is no standard household. People of the same age and income can have different dependants, debts, risks, and expectations of retirement.
“ We are very seldom in the business of finding you a better product than the one you have,” Reyneke says.
ONE SITTING, FOUR QUESTIONS Most households buy medical cover, short-term insurance, life cover, and investment separately, years apart and from different people.
THE LEG NOBODY TESTS Death can trigger capital gains tax and estate duty, while executor fees apply to the estate’ s gross value. Those are cash obligations, and an estate cannot settle them in bricks.
“ If this person died on Friday, where does the cash come from, and how long does the family wait for it?” Reyneke asks.
The relationship matters more than the product because life keeps moving: a new child, a business sold, a parent who becomes a dependant, or a move offshore.
“ Ask them what they would take away,” Reyneke says.
A portfolio nobody has seen as a complete picture is just a set of purchases. IB
FIVE QUESTIONS WORTH ASKING YOUR ADVISER
• When last did you review my medical, shortterm, life, and investment arrangements together?
• Where am I over-covered, and what could I invest instead?
• Am I using this year’ s allowances effectively, and when must I act?
• If I died on Friday, where would the cash come from?
• What would you remove from my portfolio, and why?
“ It is not new money,” Reyneke says.“ It was already being spent. We are simply pointing it somewhere that compounds instead of somewhere that duplicates.”
Tax efficiency follows the same discipline. It is a question of which asset sits in which wrapper, in whose name, and in what order it is drawn down.
94 INBOUND SA / OCTOBER 2026