Booking private withdrawals in Germany: accounts, tax, contributions

If you transfer money from your business account to your private account, that is a private withdrawal (Privatentnahme). It does not lower your profit, even if you transfer the amount every month and call it a salary. You pay income tax on your profit, not on what you withdraw. Book the withdrawal to a private account. For sole proprietorships (Einzelunternehmen), that is account 1801 (SKR03) or 2101 (SKR04) in the 2026 DATEV charts of accounts. Goods, equipment and the company car are different: if you take or use them privately, their value increases your profit, and VAT (Umsatzsteuer) is often due. In the Anlage EÜR, the form for the cash-basis profit calculation (Einnahmenüberschussrechnung) in your German tax return, you enter all withdrawals and contributions (Einlagen) of the year, including withdrawals of money.

Contents

• Does a private withdrawal cost tax?
• Booking private withdrawals: the accounts in SKR03 and SKR04
• What counts as a withdrawal
• Goods, equipment, car: when VAT is due
• Private contribution: putting money or items into the business
• Private withdrawals in the Anlage EÜR: these lines
• Is there a limit? Excess withdrawals and debt interest
• Frequently asked questions

Does a private withdrawal cost tax?

Money you take out of the business does not trigger a tax of its own and does not lower your profit. Whether you transfer little or all of the profit to your private account makes no difference to your income tax.

Example: Your profit for 2026 is €42,000. You transfer €2,500 to yourself every month, €30,000 in total. You pay tax on €42,000. If you had withdrawn only €10,000, it would still be €42,000.

The German Income Tax Act (Einkommensteuergesetz, EStG) calls money you take out for yourself a "cash withdrawal" (Barentnahme, § 4 (1) sentence 2 EStG). When profit is determined with a balance sheet, the profit is expressly "increased by the value of the withdrawals" (§ 4 (1) sentence 1 EStG), so the withdrawal is added back. What you spend on your household and your living costs you may not deduct (§ 12 no. 1 EStG).

That is why a fixed monthly salary paid to yourself changes nothing either. In a sole proprietorship, the transfer remains a cash withdrawal for tax purposes. You cannot deduct it as staff costs. Because tax is due on the whole profit, it is better to leave part of it in the business for your income tax instead of withdrawing everything.

A withdrawal only costs tax if you withdraw not a sum of money but goods, a piece of equipment or the use of your company car. Then their value increases your profit, and VAT is often added on top. Both are covered in the sections What counts as a withdrawal and When VAT is due.

Booking private withdrawals: the accounts in SKR03 and SKR04

You book a withdrawal of money as a debit to the private withdrawals account and a credit to the bank or cash account. A private contribution (Privateinlage) works exactly the other way round: debit bank, credit private contributions.

The account numbers come from the DATEV charts of accounts SKR03 and SKR04, as of 1 January 2026. For sole proprietorships, DATEV lists separate private accounts there with the note "sole proprietorships only": 1801 and 1891 in SKR03, 2101 and 2181 in SKR04. Many older guides give 1800 and 1890, or 2100 and 2180. In the 2026 chart of accounts, these accounts carry the note "VH". Your program's chart of accounts shows which numbers it uses.

Record every withdrawal individually, not as an annual total. Records must be made "individually, completely, correctly, in good time and in an orderly manner" (§ 146 (1) AO, the German Fiscal Code or Abgabenordnung). The easiest way is to write "Privatentnahme" in the payment reference of every transfer. Then you can assign the entry later without having to think about it. For a transfer, the bank statement shows the date and amount. For cash from the cash box and for goods you take home for private use, there is no receipt from a third party. In that case, record the withdrawal with a self-issued receipt (Eigenbeleg).

Withdrawals are everything the owner takes from the business "for themselves, for their household or for other purposes unrelated to the business" (§ 4 (1) sentence 2 EStG). If you pay for something private with the business card, you therefore also book the amount as a private withdrawal. Your income tax is not a business expense (Betriebsausgabe) either (§ 12 no. 3 EStG). If you pay it from the business account, book it as a withdrawal to the private taxes account.

You can record your sales and purchase invoices, for example, in the office1.cloud accounting software.

What counts as a withdrawal

Money is not the only thing that counts as a withdrawal. Goods you take home for private use, a piece of equipment you move from the business into your private life and the private use of business property also count. The law lists: "cash withdrawals, goods, products, uses and services" (§ 4 (1) sentence 2 EStG).

For withdrawals of items, you use the Teilwert (§ 6 (1) no. 4 sentence 1 EStG). That is the amount a buyer of your entire business would assign to the individual item if they continued running the business. This is how the instructions for the Anlage EÜR 2026 explain it for line 19. For work your employees do on your private home, the cost price incurred counts (instructions for line 21).

If you take an item from your fixed assets into private use, for example the laptop, two amounts go into the Anlage EÜR. The Teilwert goes into line 19 as business income. The remaining book value (Restbuchwert), meaning the purchase price minus the depreciation so far, goes as a business expense into the line for retired fixed assets: line 38 in the 2025 form, line 39 in the 2026 form. How to determine the remaining book value is explained in the article Depreciation (AfA). This does not apply to items in the pooled item (Sammelposten) (instructions for line 39). More on this in the article Low-value assets (GWG).

For the company car, you calculate the private share with the 1% rule or with a mileage logbook (Fahrtenbuch). If you use the car no more than 50 percent for business, the actual private share of the costs counts (instructions for line 20). Both are covered in detail in the articles 1% rule for company cars and Keeping a mileage logbook.

If you sell food: Bakeries, butcher's shops, restaurants, cafés and some retailers may record the goods they withdraw for their own household with fixed annual amounts per person instead of recording each withdrawal individually. For 2026, these are for example €1,885 for a bakery and €4,001 for a restaurant serving cold and hot meals, each excluding VAT. For children up to their second birthday you record nothing, up to their twelfth birthday half. You continue to record other goods, such as clothing or electrical appliances, individually (circular of 23 December 2025 from the Federal Ministry of Finance, the Bundesfinanzministerium).

Goods, equipment, car: when VAT is due

If the purchase of an item entitled you to deduct input tax (Vorsteuer), you pay VAT when you withdraw it. If there was no input tax deduction, for example because you bought the item from a private person, no VAT is due.

The German VAT Act (Umsatzsteuergesetz, UStG) treats the withdrawal of an item like a supply against payment. The condition is "that the item or its components gave entitlement to full or partial input tax deduction" (§ 3 (1b) UStG). The same applies to the private use of an item, such as the company car (§ 3 (9a) no. 1 UStG).

You may not deduct the VAT on a withdrawal as a business expense (§ 12 no. 3 EStG). You calculate it not on the sales price but on the purchase price at the time of the withdrawal. If there is no purchase price because you made the item yourself, the cost price counts (§ 10 (4) no. 1 UStG).

Example: An online retailer takes a lamp from stock home with her. She bought it for €60 net and sells it in her shop for €99. If the lamp still costs €60 net from the wholesaler today, she pays 19 percent of €60, which is €11.40 VAT. For income tax, she uses the Teilwert. Assuming it is also €60, the withdrawal increases her profit by €60.

For the company car, you may deduct a flat 20 percent from the value of private use for VAT purposes, for the costs that contain no input tax. That is what the instructions for the Anlage EÜR 2026 say for line 20. You enter the VAT on all withdrawals from lines 19 to 21 in line 17.

As a small business owner (Kleinunternehmer), you generally do not use lines 15 to 17 of the Anlage EÜR, according to the instructions. Line 17 would contain the VAT on your withdrawals. If you bought an item with input tax deduction before switching to the small business scheme (Kleinunternehmerregelung), clarify the withdrawal with your tax adviser (Steuerkanzlei).

Private contribution: putting money or items into the business

If you put private money into your business account, that is a private contribution (Privateinlage). It is not income and does not increase your profit. Typical cases are start-up money when you found the business or money you use to bridge a shortfall.

The law calls this a "cash deposit" (Bareinzahlung, § 4 (1) sentence 8 EStG). With a balance sheet, the profit is "reduced" by the value of the contributions (§ 4 (1) sentence 1 EStG). You book the cash deposit to the private contributions account, see the table with the accounts.

Conversely, if you pay a business invoice with your private card, the invoice remains a business expense. What counts is that the business caused the expense (§ 4 (4) EStG), not which account you pay from. For businesses without a separate business account, the instructions for the Anlage EÜR say that every business expense also counts as a contribution. If you do have a business account, clarify with your tax adviser how to book such an individual case.

If you bring an item from your private possessions into the business, such as a desk or a camera, that is a contribution in kind (Sacheinlage). You use the Teilwert at the time of the contribution. If you bought the item within the three years before the contribution, you use at most the purchase price, reduced by the depreciation for the time since the purchase (§ 6 (1) no. 5 EStG). From then on, you depreciate the item in the business. If the contribution value is no more than €800, you may deduct it in full in the year of the contribution, like a low-value asset (§ 6 (2) sentence 1 EStG), see Low-value assets.

Private withdrawals in the Anlage EÜR: these lines

As a sole proprietorship, you enter the total of all withdrawals and all contributions of the year in the Anlage EÜR, including withdrawals of money. This also applies if you have no loans and no debt interest.

The instructions for the Anlage EÜR 2026 say: withdrawals and contributions "are to be entered regardless of whether there is any debt interest". This expressly includes "withdrawals and contributions of money (e.g. a privately motivated withdrawal of money from the business bank account or a payout from the cash box)". In the law, the obligation to "record separately" withdrawals and contributions is in § 4 (4a) sentence 6 EStG.

Lines 19 to 21 are business income and increase the profit. The total lines for withdrawals and contributions do not change the profit. From them, the Anlage SZ, the form on debt interest (Schuldzinsen), determines the excess withdrawals, see Excess withdrawals and debt interest.

If you do not have a separate business account, things get confusing. In that case, according to the instructions, all business income also counts as a withdrawal and every business expense also counts as a contribution. The withdrawal and contribution lines then contain all your income and expenses.

How the rest of the Anlage EÜR is structured is explained in the article Doing your own cash-basis profit calculation (EÜR).

Is there a limit? Excess withdrawals and debt interest

You may also withdraw more than you earn and contribute. But if you then pay interest on loans or an overdraft in the business, you may no longer deduct part of that interest. The Income Tax Act does not set a fixed upper limit for withdrawals.

This is how § 4 (4a) EStG calculates it:

1. The excess withdrawal (Überentnahme) is the amount by which your withdrawals exceed the profit and the contributions of the year. Excess withdrawals from earlier years are added. If profit and contributions exceeded the withdrawals in earlier years, that amount is deducted.
2. 6 percent of these excess withdrawals count as non-deductible debt interest. The instructions for the Anlage EÜR name a further upper limit: no more than 6 percent of the total surplus of withdrawals over all years.
3. At most, the debt interest of the year minus €2,050 is added to the profit. Up to €2,050 of debt interest therefore always remains deductible.
4. Interest on a loan you used to buy fixed assets, such as a machine or the company car, remains fully deductible.

Example without previous years: profit €30,000, no contributions, withdrawals €40,000. The excess withdrawal is €10,000, and 6 percent of it is €600. You pay €3,000 in overdraft interest. The most that could be added would be 3,000 minus 2,050, which is €950. The amount added is €600, so your profit rises to €30,600.

If your debt interest, not counting loans for fixed assets, is over €2,050, you also have to file the Anlage SZ as a sole proprietorship. This is stated in the Federal Ministry of Finance's circular of 1 September 2026 on the Anlage EÜR 2026.

Frequently asked questions

Do I have to record private withdrawals as a small business owner?

Yes. The small business scheme only concerns VAT. The obligation to enter withdrawals and contributions in the Anlage EÜR applies to every sole proprietorship, even without debt interest.

How much tax is due on a private withdrawal?

You pay no separate tax on a withdrawal of money. For goods, equipment and private use of the company car, the value increases your profit. You pay income tax on it at your personal tax rate, often plus VAT, see When VAT is due.

Do I need a separate business account?

The instructions for the Anlage EÜR do not require a separate business account. Without one, however, all business income also counts as a withdrawal and every business expense also counts as a contribution. With a separate account, you can see your withdrawals at a glance.

Is a private withdrawal a business expense?

No. Business expenses are only expenses "caused by the business" (§ 4 (4) EStG). You may not deduct money for your household and your living costs (§ 12 no. 1 EStG).

Does this also apply to a GmbH or UG?

No. This article applies to sole proprietorships. GmbHs and UGs, the German limited company forms, have their own rules. Clarify with your tax adviser how to take money out for yourself there.

Sources

• § 4 EStG, definition of profit (subsection 1 withdrawals and contributions, subsection 4 business expenses, subsection 4a excess withdrawals)
• § 6 EStG, valuation (subsection 1 no. 4 withdrawals, no. 5 contributions)
• § 12 EStG, non-deductible expenses (no. 1 private living costs, no. 3 taxes)
• § 146 AO, rules for bookkeeping and records
• § 3 UStG, supply of goods and other services (subsections 1b and 9a)
• § 10 UStG, taxable amount (subsection 4)
• Federal Ministry of Finance: Anlage EÜR 2026 with instructions, circular of 1 September 2026
• Federal Ministry of Finance: Anlage EÜR 2025 with instructions, circular of 29 August 2025
• Federal Ministry of Finance: flat-rate amounts for withdrawals of goods without payment (Sachentnahmen) 2026, circular of 23 December 2025
• DATEV chart of accounts SKR03 2026 and SKR04 2026

Try Easy Invoice free for 10 days — no payment details, the trial ends by itself.