SARS getting a new secret weapon

SARS is set to gain unprecedented automatic access to detailed offshore property information from more than 20 countries, giving the taxman full visibility of South African taxpayers’ foreign real estate.

Tax Consulting South Africa’s legal manager of cross border taxation, Delano Abdoll, and tax legal associate, Tasmin Kotze, explained that SARS is set to add a new weapon to its arsenal.

Following a new international initiative to exchange data on offshore immovable property, SARS will soon automatically receive detailed information about every foreign immovable property owned by taxpayers.

Abdoll and Kotze warned that this includes everything from a holiday villa in Portugal or an investment apartment in France, to an Airbnb in Spain.

“If you own foreign immovable property and still remain a South African tax resident, that information will soon be in SARS’s hands,” they said.

Notably, making any rental income or capital gains from these properties falls squarely into South Africa’s residency-based tax net.

South Africa is among 25 jurisdictions that have formally signalled their intention to be part of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) new reporting framework.

This agreement facilitates the automatic exchange of information on non-financial assets, particularly immovable property, to enhance global tax law enforcement.

“This update will further equip SARS with more detailed information on taxpayers’ assets and investment portfolios, particularly offshore property,” Abdoll and Kotze said.

It will also improve SARS’ ability to potentially collect taxes that may otherwise have been lost from the South African fiscus.

Other participating jurisdictions to the new framework are Belgium, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Korea, Lithuania, Malta, and New Zealand.

Norway, Peru, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom, and the United Kingdom’s Overseas Territory of Gibraltar also form part of the framework.

Message for South Africans living abroad

In a joint statement on 4 December 2025, the jurisdictions noted that ownership and transactions involving immovable property increasingly have cross-border elements, Abdoll and Kotze said.

They highlighted the need for improved mechanisms to ensure that tax authorities have access to relevant information on non-financial assets, particularly immovable property held abroad and any income derived from such assets.

The OECD’s new framework, the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement on Automatic Exchange of Readily Available Information on Immovable Property (IPI MCAA), will close one of the last remaining gaps in global tax transparency.

“We therefore welcome the new IPI MCAA between tax authorities developed by the OECD,” SARS said in its statement.

The participating jurisdictions confirmed that until now, global reporting focused only on financial assets and crypto-assets under the Common Reporting Standard (CRS) and the Crypto-Asset Reporting Framework (CARF).

However, no equivalent system has been in place for non-financial assets, particularly foreign immovable property.

South Africa plans to implement the new reporting rules by 2029 or 2030, following the completion of its internal legislative process.

“Once automatic property reporting begins, SARS will have full visibility – and may ask why your offshore assets were never declared,” Abdoll and Kotze warned.

For this reason, South Africans living abroad should consider ceasing their South African tax residency if they have not done so already. A properly executed tax residency cessation ensures –

• Foreign assets are not taxed by SARS
• Foreign rental income is not taxed by SARS
• Foreign property sales cannot trigger South African capital gains tax
• SARS cannot retrospectively question the taxpayer’s offshore wealth

Abdoll and Kotze explained that it is crucial for South African expatriates who have left the country permanently, no longer intend to return, and have purchased property abroad to take note of this new SARS framework.

“Undergoing the Financial Emigration procedure should be a priority before automatic global property reporting goes live,” they said.