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A certified valuer will listen to your situation and answer any questions you may have, at no cost.
Dated, reasoned market values for the fund assets with no quoted price, such as shares in the family company, units in a related trust, premises leased back to the members' business and loans, prepared for Brisbane trustees and the auditor who has to accept them.
Indicative valuations from A$799. Certified Summary and Detailed reports from seven business days.
An SMSF must report every asset at market value at 30 June and keep objective, supportable evidence of each figure. For assets without a quoted price, such as private company shares, related unit trust units, premises leased to the members' business or a loan, Brisbane trustees need a dated valuation from someone independent of the fund.
Each year an SMSF auditor reports on two questions: whether the financial statements are right, and whether the fund has complied with superannuation law. Both turn on asset values. A fund holding listed shares and a term deposit is checked against statements. A fund holding part of the members' own business is different, because the auditor must decide whether the amount in the accounts is a market value or an optimistic guess, and it is the trustees who carry the burden of showing which.
Brisbane funds tend to hold the same few difficult assets. A warehouse in Acacia Ridge, Rocklea or Wacol leased to the members' transport or manufacturing company. A tenancy on the Australia TradeCoast around Eagle Farm let to a freight business the family runs. Consulting rooms near the Herston or Woolloongabba hospital precincts leased to the members' practice. A minority stake in a Milton or Fortitude Valley professional services firm. Units in a trust that owns a shop in Chermside or Carindale. A loan to a relative's company. Each needs a method, evidence and a valuation date that fits why the figure is wanted.
The number does more work than many trustees expect. It feeds each member's total superannuation balance, which affects contribution caps and Division 296. It sets the transfer balance credit when a retirement phase pension starts, and the minimum drawdown for the year. It drives the in-house asset test and its 5 per cent limit. And a related-party price that is not a market price can bring in the non-arm's length income rules, taxing the affected income at the highest rate.
We value the unlisted assets SMSF auditors challenge most often, dated to the event that calls for the value. The trustees make the decisions, your accountant prepares the accounts and the auditor applies the law; we provide a figure, with the reasoning shown, that each of them can rely on.
A certified valuer will listen to your situation and answer any questions you may have, at no cost.
Regulation 8.02B of the Superannuation Industry (Supervision) Regulations 1994 requires an SMSF to prepare its financial statements with assets at market value. The ATO's guidance on valuing SMSF assets says the evidence should be objective and supportable, prepared by someone with relevant skill, and refreshed when circumstances change. Not every asset needs a full formal valuation every year; between valuations, a documented review showing that nothing material has changed can be sufficient.
The annual accounts carry every asset at market value as at the last day of the financial year. A figure repeated from the year before, with no sign that anyone looked at it, attracts questions, and an auditor who cannot get comfortable with a material asset must qualify the audit report and may need to report the matter to the ATO.
Asset values on the day the pension starts fix the credit to the member's transfer balance account and the base for the minimum annual payment. Neither is simple to correct once reported, so for any unlisted asset funding the pension, a valuation dated to that day is the prudent choice.
A fund can acquire only certain assets from a related party, business real property among them, and only at market value, and any sale to a related party must be at arm's length. Transferring an Acacia Ridge warehouse into the fund, or selling family company shares out of it, needs a valuation dated to the transaction. On a property transfer the Queensland Revenue Office will also consider value when it assesses transfer duty under the Duties Act 2001 (Qld), so the same evidence often serves twice.
Rollovers and benefit payments, a shift between accumulation and retirement phase, winding up the fund, and anything that might move a value materially between balance dates: an anchor tenant leaving a suburban shopping strip, the investee company losing its largest contract, or the death of a member.
Division 296 imposes an additional tax on earnings attributable to the part of a member's total superannuation balance above its threshold, and 30 June 2026 is the first date on which those balances are measured. A fund holding property, private company shares or unlisted units on that date needs a market value for each as at 30 June 2026, even if none was obtained then. A valuation prepared now can address that date, using only information that was known or reasonably knowable at the time. The figure may be relevant again if the fund's adviser recommends resetting the cost base of fund assets to their 30 June 2026 value. Your adviser confirms the thresholds, rates and any elections for each member; we provide the values.
An auditor's first question is whether the method fits the asset, so the report starts there as well. A company that holds only cash and listed investments can be valued on its net assets. A trading company cannot, because its balance sheet omits the goodwill a buyer would pay for its earnings.
Shares in a private company or units in a trading trust are valued using the income approach: normalised maintainable earnings capitalised at a rate that reflects the risk, cross-checked with sales evidence, and with net assets as a floor. Where the fund holds less than a controlling interest, the report considers whether a discount for lack of control or marketability is justified by the facts, such as the shareholders' agreement and the dividend history, and explains its conclusion. Applying a discount by default fails review just as surely as ignoring one.
Business real property leased to the members' business needs both a capital value and a market rent, and the rent is the figure most often left unsupported. Across Brisbane's industrial areas, from Acacia Ridge and Rocklea to Wacol and the TradeCoast, and around the medical precincts at Herston and Woolloongabba, there is usually enough leasing evidence to test it; where the capital value is material, a report from a registered property valuer supports it. Related unit trust units are valued together with the trust's underlying property at the same date, with a check that the trust still meets the conditions that keep the units outside the in-house asset limit. Loans are valued according to the borrower's ability to repay, the security held and whether the terms are commercial. Collectables are governed by their own regulation, including the requirement for a qualified independent valuer when one is sold to a related party.
These issues come up in SMSF audits every year. Any of them can lead to a qualified audit report or a contravention report, and each is avoided with a suitable method applied at the right date.
An SMSF valuation is read by the fund's auditor and, from time to time, by the ATO. A certified Summary report usually covers that, because it sets out the method, the evidence and the reasoning without the auditor needing our working papers. The Detailed report is worth the extra depth when a related-party transaction is large, a pension is starting on a substantial unlisted asset, or a member's Division 296 position at 30 June 2026 turns on the figure.
Each report starts with the trigger, the valuation date, the standard of value and the documents relied on, then values each asset by the method that fits it. A trading company is supported by its normalisation schedule, maintainable earnings and capitalisation rate, each sourced. Leased premises are supported by sales and rental evidence presented together. The reconciliation shows how the conclusion was reached, so the auditor can work through it independently, though we are happy to take the call.
A certified valuer with no interest in the fund, its members or the entities valued signs every report, answers the auditor's questions and defends the opinion if the ATO reviews the fund. Independence is much of what the auditor is relying on, which is why a brief letter from the fund's own accountant rarely closes the matter. If the same asset is later contested, for instance in a family provision claim under section 41 of the Succession Act 1981 (Qld) or a shareholder dispute in the Supreme Court of Queensland, the valuer who signed the SMSF report can explain how the figure was reached.
Take the largest asset in the fund that has no quoted price. If the auditor asked for its evidence tomorrow, could you hand over a dated, reasoned report from someone with nothing to gain from the figure, or only a number carried over from last year's accounts? If the answer is the second, that asset is where to begin.
Talk your situation through with a certified valuer before you commit to anything, at no cost.