EOFY for Investors: Wealth and Estate Moves to Make Before 30 June
For most investors, EOFY tax planning gets boiled down to two questions: Have I topped up my super? Have I sold anything I shouldn't have? Both matter. Neither is the whole picture.
The more interesting opportunities sit one layer beneath the obvious. Recontribution strategies. Loss harvesting (without falling into a wash sale). Bring-forward super caps. Spouse splitting. None of these have a flashing red deadline next to them, which is exactly why they're so easy to miss.
Each can shift a meaningful amount of long-term value when used at the right moment – and EOFY is one of the few windows in the year where that moment arrives.
This article walks through the wealth and estate planning levers most worth thinking about before 30 June 2026.
EOFY for investors is a structure conversation, not a timing one
Business EOFY planning is mostly about timing – bringing forward deductions, paying super on time, keeping cashflow tidy.
Investor EOFY planning is mostly about structure.
Where is the wealth held? In whose name? In what tax environment? With what cost base? Refining the answers to those questions by even a few percentage points each year compounds into materially different outcomes over a decade.
That's the lens for what follows.
The super recontribution strategy
Probably the most underused tool in the personal EOFY toolkit – and one that becomes more valuable the older you get.
Here's the idea in plain terms.
Inside super, every member's balance is split into two "buckets":
a taxable component, built up from your employer contributions, salary sacrifice and earnings, and
a tax-free component, built up from contributions you've made out of your own after-tax money.
While you're alive, which bucket your money sits in barely matters. After you're gone, it can matter enormously. If your super is paid as a death benefit to a non-dependant – typically an adult child – the taxable component is generally taxed at 15% (plus Medicare levy) in their hands (an untaxed element, which can arise in some SMSFs, is taxed at up to 30% plus the levy). The tax-free component passes through untouched.
A recontribution strategy reduces the size of the taxable bucket over time. The mechanics:
1. Withdraw a lump sum from super (it comes out as a proportional mix of both buckets and cannot be selectively drawn from one component),
2. Recontribute the same amount as a non-concessional contribution,
3. The recontributed amount lands entirely in the tax-free bucket.
Done across a few years, it can convert a meaningful portion of your balance from taxable to tax-free – and reduce or eliminate the tax your adult children would otherwise pay on inheriting your super.
It's not for everyone. The strategy requires:
having unrestricted access to your super – typically by meeting a condition of release such as retiring after preservation age, or reaching 65,
being under 75,
room within your non-concessional contribution cap, and
careful coordination with any pension you're already drawing.
It's not a 30 June scramble either – but the resolution to start, or to make this year's recontribution, does need to be in motion before EOFY.
Bring-forward non-concessional contributions
The standard non-concessional cap (the limit on contributions made from your after-tax money) is currently $120,000 (rising to $130,000 from 1 July 2026 under indexation) a year.
If you're under 75 and your total super balance sits below the relevant threshold, the bring-forward rule lets you use up to three years' worth of cap in a single year – potentially $360,000 in one go this year, or $390,000 once the cap is indexed from 1 July 2026.
Why bother thinking about this in June rather than next September?
The bring-forward is triggered the moment the contribution is made,
your eligibility is tested against your balance at the previous 30 June, so a balance change between now and EOFY can affect what's available next year, and
for members thinking about Division 296 (more on that below), the timing of large contributions is a strategic decision in its own right.
Spouse contribution splitting
A genuinely overlooked lever, particularly for couples with imbalanced super balances.
Up to 85% of your eligible concessional contributions from the previous financial year can be split across to your spouse's super account. You apply to your fund, and most funds require it before the end of the financial year following the year the contributions were made.
Why bother?
It evens up balances between spouses, helping both stay below thresholds (the transfer balance cap, the Division 296 thresholds, and so on),
it can bring forward access to super if one spouse is older than the other,
it supports a younger or lower-earning spouse's retirement income.
The form is short. The benefit, applied year after year, is not.
Loss harvesting (and the wash sale trap)
Loss harvesting is the practice of selling an investment at a loss to crystallise that loss against realised capital gains. Done well, it's legitimate and useful. Capital losses can offset current-year capital gains, and any unused balance carries forward indefinitely.
Three things to know:
Capital losses can only offset capital gains – not your salary, business income or rental income.
Apply losses against undiscounted gains first where possible. The 50% capital gains tax (CGT) discount applies after losses are netted, so absorbing a discounted gain with a loss is mathematically inefficient.
Wash sales are a real risk. If you sell an asset to crystallise a loss and then buy it (or something substantially identical) back shortly after, the ATO may treat the arrangement as tax-driven and deny the loss.
A useful rule of thumb:
If you'd be comfortable explaining the commercial reason for the sale to the ATO without mentioning the tax loss, you're probably fine. If you wouldn't, you're probably not.
Moving assets into super (the "in-specie" contribution)
For self-managed super fund (SMSF) members in particular, EOFY is the right moment to consider whether contributing assets directly into super – rather than cash – makes sense. This is called an in-specie contribution.
Eligible assets include listed shares, business real property and certain managed investments. Most personal-use assets, residential property owned personally and many related-party assets cannot be contributed. They're contributed at market value and counted against your contribution caps.
The appeal:
It shifts the asset out of your personal name (taxed at your marginal rate, potentially 47%) and into super (taxed at 15% on earnings, potentially 0% in pension phase),
it can use up unused contribution caps without needing to find the cash,
it can be paired with a recontribution strategy.
The catches:
The transfer is itself a CGT event for you personally, calculated at market value,
restrictions apply to what can be contributed (the rules around related-party assets are particularly strict),
timing and documentation around 30 June need to be precise to ensure the contribution counts in the right year.
This is one of those strategies that sounds simple, isn't, and is worth professional input before pulling the trigger.
CGT timing: the questions worth asking before you sell
Beyond loss harvesting, the timing of when you sell an investment is one of the few levers genuinely within your control. Worth working through, before you trade:
Is my tax rate likely to be lower next year? A planned career change, retirement, parental leave, business sale or one-off income event can materially shift the answer.
Is the asset within a few weeks of qualifying for the 50% CGT discount (12-month holding rule)? If so, even a short delay can halve the assessable gain.
Are there carry-forward capital losses sitting on prior years' returns waiting to be used?
Does the disposal trigger any small business CGT concessions that need pre-30 June structuring?
Each question is worth answering before the trade is executed, not after.
A larger structural shift now sits behind all of these questions. The 2026-27 Budget announced that, from 1 July 2027, the 50% CGT discount for individuals, trusts and partnerships will be replaced by cost base indexation and a 30% minimum tax on net capital gains. Gains accrued up to 1 July 2027 continue to attract the existing 50% discount, which makes the next two financial years a defined window to consider whether crystallising long-held personal gains under the current rules is worthwhile. The measure is announced but not yet legislated, and super funds are unaffected (they retain the one-third discount) – but for assets held in your own name, it reframes the timing question well beyond the 12-month rule above.
Pre-30 June housekeeping
A short list of items that often get left until the last week, that should be managed months earlier:
Investment loan interest prepayments – generally able to be brought forward 12 months for individuals (subject to the prepayment deduction rules),
Income protection premiums held outside super – generally deductible, and prepayable on the same basis,
Managed fund records – make sure cost base records reflect tax-deferred amounts and AMIT cost base adjustments,
Cryptocurrency activity – every sale, swap and conversion is a CGT event, and the ATO receives data directly from exchanges,
Foreign income and assets – offshore dividends, interest, rental income and capital gains often need active reconstruction at tax time.
A note on Division 296
For investors with a total super balance approaching or exceeding $3 million, the Division 296 regime adds a layer to almost every decision in this article.
Division 296 is now law (it passed Parliament on 10 March 2026 and commences on 1 July 2026, with 2026-27 the first affected year). It imposes an additional 15% tax on the portion of super earnings attributable to a total super balance above $3 million, and a further 10% on earnings attributable to the portion above $10 million (headline rates of 30% and 40% respectively once the existing 15% fund tax is included). Both thresholds are indexed, the tax applies on a realised-earnings basis (the earlier proposal to tax unrealised gains was dropped), and SMSFs may elect a one-off cost base reset to 30 June 2026.
The strategies above don't change because of Division 296. But the weight given to each one does:
recontribution strategies become more valuable for shifting tax components ahead of the regime,
spouse splitting becomes a way to keep both members under thresholds,
bring-forward non-concessional contributions may be more attractive before commencement than after,
in-specie contribution decisions need to factor in the long-term tax environment.
For high-balance members, with commencement now imminent, the months to 30 June are for deliberate modelling and positioning – not last-minute reaction.
What this means for you
EOFY isn't only a deadline. For investors, it's the one point in the year where the tax, super, estate planning and structuring conversations are all live at the same time.
The strategies in this article aren't really about saving tax in 2025–26. They're about shaping how your wealth is held, taxed and eventually transferred over the next two decades.
Decisions made now shape outcomes in 2030, 2040 and beyond.
Final thoughts
The most valuable EOFY work for investors is rarely the last-minute kind. It's the work done in June – or earlier – that lets the structure breathe, the contributions land, the paperwork align and the strategy reflect a longer view than the next twelve months.
If you'd like to sit down with us to review your investment, super and estate planning position ahead of 30 June, our team is here to help you plan with clarity, confidence and care.
If you have any questions, please contact Resolve on 02 6147 6741 or via hello@resolve-advisory.com.au.
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