Planning a phased emigration from South Africa: when one partner leaves first, and the other follows later

When one partner leaves South Africa before the other, the two of you end up with different tax residency statuses. That mismatch brings real financial planning risks. It affects the timing of your tax emigration from South Africa, your exchange control allowances, and when you can access your South African retirement annuities.

Most South African families don’t emigrate on a single flight. One partner moves ahead for a new job, while the other stays behind to finish a school term, sell the house, wind down a business, or wait for a second visa to come through. It’s a sensible way to emigrate, and it’s also a financial planning trap if nobody is watching the gap between.

What changes when you and your partner emigrate at different times, and how do you plan the second half of your move, so it doesn’t undo the financial groundwork laid by the first? Let’s take a look.

Why do South African families emigrate in phases?

Phased emigration happens for entirely practical reasons. A new employer may need someone on the ground before a visa for the rest of the family has cleared. A couple may decide the primary earner should start work while the property back home is still on the market. Or a family may want one partner to settle the practical details, such as schools, housing, and medical cover, before the children are uprooted from their current routine.

None of that is unusual, and none of it is a problem on its own. The problem shows up in the finances.

Read more: Tax Residency and Your Retirement Savings: The Key to Unlocking Your Funds

How does South African tax residency work when partners emigrate at different times?

Tax residency in South Africa is assessed individually, not per household or couple.

SARS uses two separate tests to determine whether someone is a South African tax resident:

• The ordinarily resident test is applied first. It is an assessment of where a person’s real home is, meaning the country to which they would naturally return after their travels. It takes into account factors such as family and social ties, business and financial interests, immigration status, the location of personal belongings, and the purpose and frequency of time spent abroad. Intention carries significant weight.
• The physical presence test, which only applies if the person is not ordinarily resident. It is a day-count rule: a person is a tax resident if they spend more than 91 days in South Africa in the current tax year, more than 91 days in each of the preceding five tax years, and more than 915 days in total over those five years.

Ceasing your South African tax residency also works differently under each test. A person who is resident only under the physical presence test stops being a resident after spending a continuous period of at least 330 full days outside South Africa, backdated to the day they left. A person who is ordinarily resident can’t rely on that day count. They must show that their real home has genuinely moved abroad.

A partner who left a year ago and has settled into a new country may already have ceased to be a South African tax resident or be close to it. The partner still living and working in South Africa, by definition, has not. That’s not an oversight to fix. It’s the expected shape of a phased move. One caution, though: because family ties count heavily in the ordinarily resident test, a spouse who remains in South Africa can weaken the departed partner’s case for having ceased residency. It’s worth having this assessed rather than assumed. You can find more details on both tests in the SARS guide on ceasing to be a tax resident.

What changes once only one partner becomes a South African tax non-resident?

Ceasing tax residency in South Africa is not just a change of label. It has immediate and lasting financial consequences.

When one partner ceases tax residency, the following applies:

• The partner who ceases residency triggers a deemed disposal of their worldwide assets for capital gains tax (CGT) purposes. South African immovable property is excluded. If the couple is married in community of property, this exit charge applies to the emigrating partner’s half share of the joint estate, even where assets are in the resident partner’s name.
• From that point on, SARS taxes the non-resident partner only on South African-sourced income.
• The resident partner continues to pay tax on worldwide income as before. In a community of property marriage, that includes their half share of the investment income from all joint estate assets, wherever those assets sit.

The interaction between the joint estate rules and the exit charge can get complicated, so couples married in community of property should get proper tax advice before either partner ceases tax residency.

This mismatch affects everything the couple holds jointly. Once one partner has ceased residency, each partner’s share of a bank account, property, or investment portfolio follows their own tax status. The same asset can be part resident and part non-resident until the second partner also ceases residency. Jointly held assets therefore need a clear plan, not just the assumption that “the family” is now non-resident.

Read more: Why should I submit SARS tax returns if I have ceased my tax residency?

How does financial emigration from South Africa work for a phased move?

The term “financial emigration” is outdated, as the formal process with the South African Reserve Bank ended in 2021. The current process is known as tax emigration, which involves ceasing tax residency with SARS. Moving larger amounts of money abroad may also require an Approval for International Transfer (AIT).

For a phased move, two details are particularly important in practice:

1. Annual exchange control allowances are per person, not per couple. Partners need to decide who transfers what, and when. This is an important financial decision, not just an administrative task.
2. The partner still in South Africa may need SARS tax clearance to move larger sums. This applies even if the other partner has already completed their tax emigration. One partner being “done” does not simplify the other’s process.

What is the three-year retirement annuity rule, and does it apply to both partners?

To withdraw from a South African retirement annuity or preservation fund, you must cease your South African tax residency. You need to be a non-resident for at least three years. This is a critical point that many people get wrong. The three-year clock starts from the date of physical departure from South Africa, not from when the SARS tax emigration paperwork is finalised.

Ordinary pension funds are not subject to this restriction.

For a couple who left at different times, this means two entirely separate countdowns. If one partner departed two years before the other, their clock has already been running for two years. They should not expect to access their retirement annuities at the same time, since they are not starting from the same date.

Read more: South African tax residency rules – expats, are you still tax residents of South Africa?

A practical checklist for staggered movers

Phased emigration works best when both partners track their positions separately from the start. The following steps are worth setting up early:

• Establish departure evidence for both partners from the outset. This includes passport stamps, employment contracts, and lease agreements, even for the partner who has not yet left
• Review all jointly held property, accounts, and investments. Agree on how and when each will be transferred or restructured, given that they now sit in two different tax positions.
• Revisit wills, medical aid, and short-term insurance. These depend on where each partner actually lives, not on tax status.
• Plan cross-border transfers in tranches. Make use of each partner’s individual exchange control allowances rather than treating the household money as a single pool.
• Track each partner’s three-year retirement annuity clock separately if fund access is part of the long-term plan.

Common pitfalls to avoid during a phased emigration

A few mistakes arise often during phased moves:

• Assuming a spouse’s non-resident status transfers automatically after one partner emigrates. It does not. Each individual must satisfy SARS’s residency tests independently.
• Allowing SARS records to lapse for the partner still in South Africa. This can complicate or delay their own tax emigration process when the time comes.
• Treating jointly held assets as already “emigrated” before the second partner has formally ceased South African tax residency.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Does emigrating from South Africa affect my spouse’s SA tax residency automatically?

No. SARS assesses tax residency on an individual basis. Each partner must independently satisfy either the ordinarily resident test or the physical presence test to cease being a South African tax resident. One partner’s non-resident status has no automatic bearing on the other.

Q: Can my spouse and I use our exchange control allowances together when transferring money abroad?

No. Exchange control allowances in South Africa apply per individual. Each partner must manage their own allowances separately.

Q: What if one partner is already a tax non-resident, but the other hasn’t started the process yet?

The partner who remains in South Africa is still subject to SARS tax on worldwide income. They must follow their own tax emigration process in full when the time comes. The partner who has already emigrated cannot streamline or substitute for that process.

Read more: Breaking tax residency with SA: when to apply the physical presence or ordinary residence test

Get a tax emigration plan built around both of you

A staggered move can benefit a family, but only if both partners’ tax and exchange control situations are mapped out separately. Treating the household as one financial unit during the transitional period can be a costly mistake. Unfortunately, it is also one of the most common mistakes in phased emigration planning.

What we have found in our work with clients is that it is crucial to work out a plan specifically according to a family’s needs. SARS has very specific requirements and it is important to be aware of these.

FinGlobal specialises in exactly this kind of situation. FinGlobal creates a tailored financial emigration plan that covers tax emigration from South Africa, retirement annuity withdrawal, and cross-border transfers for each family member. These are based directly on your actual timeline.

If you are in the middle of a phased move, or about to start one, get in touch with FinGlobal to discuss a plan built around your family’s specific dates. You can also read more about financial emigration from South Africa on the FinGlobal website.