Transfer & Bond Cost Calculator

This calculator supplies an accurate estimate of the transfer and bond costs that can be expected to be incurred when purchasing a residential property.

The transfer costs consist of mainly transfer duties and conveyance fees. Transfer duties are levied by the government and depend on the legal nature of the entity purchasing the property. Companies, closed corporations and trusts incur transfer duties at a fixed rate of 8% of the property purchase price, while natural persons incur duties on a sliding scale - currently all property purchase prices below R500,000 are exempt from transfer duty, while duties of 5% are levied on properties priced between R500,000 and R1,000,000. Properties prices above R1,000,000 attract transfer duties of 8%.

Conveyance fees are payable to the lawyers responsible for the registration of the property in the buyer's name. These costs are also levied on a sliding scale based on the property purchase price.

Bond costs are payable upon registration of the bond in the name of the buyer. Some of these costs have become negotiable because a lot of bond originators have recently been offering to pay these costs on behalf of the buyer. This results in almost no bond registration fees being payable but there are some bond costs that are typically excluded from these types of arrangements.

After the National Credit Act came into effect, banks have increased their initiation charges substantially (which is usually not covered by originators offering no bond registration fees). The fees are calculated on a sliding scale based on the bond amount that is required and also differ between the four major banks. In most cases the buyer will have the option of adding the charges to the bond capital amount and repaying these charges over the entire bond period.

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