Centrelink Assets Test Calculator

Understanding centrelink assets tests in Australia

The free area: hold this much and keep the full pension

The assets test starts with a free area you can hold and still receive the full pension. From March 2026 that's about $321,500 for a single homeowner and $481,500 for a homeowner couple. Because non-homeowners typically hold their wealth in savings rather than bricks, they get much higher free areas, around $579,500 for a single and $739,500 for a couple. Below the relevant figure, your assets don't reduce your pension by a cent. The gap between the homeowner and non-homeowner figures, roughly $258,000, is Centrelink's rough allowance for the value of a home, which is why selling or buying a home in retirement can shift your pension in either direction even though the home itself is exempt.

The $3-per-$1,000 taper

Once you're over the free area the pension tapers by $3 a fortnight for every $1,000 of assessable assets above it. That sounds mild, but annualised it's a loss of about $7,800 of pension a year for every $100,000 over the threshold, a steeper effective rate than most people expect and steeper than it was before 2017. The payment keeps falling until it reaches nil at roughly $722,000 of assessable assets for a single homeowner and $1,085,000 for a homeowner couple. Non-homeowner cut-offs sit higher again, near $980,000 for a single and $1,343,000 for a couple. Between the free area and the cut-off you're on a part pension that drops smoothly as your assessable assets grow. One quirk worth understanding is that the steep $7,800-per-$100,000 taper creates a band where having more assets can leave you worse off overall, because the extra savings rarely earn enough to replace the pension they cost you. Financial planners call this the 'taper trap'. It's most acute for people just above the free area, and it's the reason some retirees in that band are deliberately advised to spend down on their home, a holiday or durable goods rather than hold idle cash that's quietly suppressing their pension.

What Centrelink actually counts

What gets counted surprises people. Your principal home is fully exempt no matter its value, but Centrelink assesses the market resale value of almost everything else: bank and term-deposit balances, shares and managed funds, account-based pensions once you've reached pension age, investment and holiday properties, business and farm assets, collectables, caravans, boats, and household contents and vehicles. The valuation basis matters as much as the list. Furniture, whitegoods and personal effects are assessed at second-hand garage-sale prices, not replacement cost, and your car at its trade-in value, so a household that names a $60,000 contents figure on instinct is usually over-stating by tens of thousands and quietly giving up pension for nothing.

Exemptions and special rules

Several things sit outside the test or get special treatment, and knowing them is where real money is found. Super held by a partner who hasn't yet reached Age Pension age is exempt from the assets test until they do. A funeral bond up to the allowable limit (around $15,500) is exempt, as are prepaid funeral expenses. Granny-flat arrangements, where you transfer money or a home for a right to live somewhere for life, have their own valuation rules that can avoid a gifting penalty if structured correctly. Home modifications and renovations convert assessable cash into exempt home value. None of these are loopholes; they're deliberate features of the system that reward planning ahead.

Gifting limits and getting an exact figure

Gifting can't be used to dodge the test. Anything you give away beyond $10,000 in a single financial year, or more than $30,000 across any rolling five-year period, is still counted as your asset and deemed for income for five years from the date you gave it. So writing a large cheque to the kids the week before claiming achieves nothing for five years. This tool shows where your total sits in the full, part or nil band, but it's indicative only and the income test runs alongside it, with Centrelink paying under whichever test leaves you worse off. For an exact assessment, list your assets in your Centrelink online account or book a free Services Australia Financial Information Service appointment before making any big moves.