My husband and I are down to one income and would like to take some pressure off our home loan by selling an investment property. It was purchased using SMSF. We are hoping to use the equity to pay down the loan but not sure if we can?

if you have an SMSF and the SMSF owns the house then the cash from the sale of the house must stay in the SMSF. The only way you can access this cash is to satisfy a condition of release (eg retire, die, etc) to access your super benefits as a lump sum or income stream.

If your SMSF has a shortfall in its cashflow that means youhave no choice but to top up the super fund with personal contributions then it would seem sensible that the fund has to sell the property. But the question needs to be asked: "who would have advised you to load up your SMSF with such a high level of debt in the first place???"

I STRONGLY recommend you go and see a financial planner and an accountant with runs on the board with SMSF and get some help.

good luck with it

regards
Brendan

Hi Helen,

As Brendan has said. The propery in the SMSF is an asset of the SMSF. You can sell it to pay down any loan in the SMSF but unless you are 57 or older you will struggle to be allowed to access any money that is in the SMSF.

Sounds like a bit of a tough situation you are in. Im more than happy to talk to you over the phone initially to see if there is any way I can help.

I’ve got plenty of experience with SMSF & propery sp if there’s a way out of the situation I’ll be able to help.

Regards
James
03 9909 5800
James.wrigley@firstfinancial.com.au