Riester transfer

Is your Riester still worth it?

Many people pay into a Riester contract for years without knowing what it will amount to. From 2027 there is an alternative: the state-subsidised Altersvorsorgedepot. Here is what you can do with your existing contract – and what each option means for you.

  • Subsidy starts 1 January 2027
  • Transferring costs you no allowances
  • Notice period: 3 months to quarter-end
Your options

Three ways, and one costs you the subsidy.

What happens to your Riester contract is your decision. The law gives you three options, and what separates them is mainly what happens to the allowances and tax advantages you have already received.

  1. Cancel

    Close the contract and have the balance paid out.

    This counts as a harmful use of the capital: you repay the allowances you received and any separately assessed tax advantages. The gains on that capital do stay with you – but they are not tax-free: in the year they are paid out they are taxed as sonstige Einkünfte (other income) at your personal rate. Your provider may also charge for closing the contract.

  2. Suspend

    Stop paying in, leave the balance where it is.

    The balance stays in the contract, just without new contributions – the subsidy you already have is kept, and so are the old contract’s costs and guarantee rules. As long as you do not conclude a new subsidised contract, your Riester contract stays a Bestandsvertrag and keeps the old subsidy rules. Conclude one after 31 December 2026 and the new subsidy applies uniformly to all your contracts: the allowances and tax advantages you have already received stay yours – but future allowances are recalculated and depend on how much you pay in. Instead of the fixed €175 basic allowance there are then 50 cents per euro on the first €360, so anyone paying in little gets less than today. And if you pay into both contracts, the allowance is split across at most two contracts in proportion to your contributions – it does not double. The switch then applies permanently to all your contracts.

  3. The route into the Altersvorsorgedepot

    Transfer

    Take the balance, allowances included, into a new contract.

    From 2027 the destination can be an Altersvorsorgedepot. The transfer does not count as a harmful use and is tax-free: you repay none of the allowances or tax advantages you already have – they travel with the money. Two things to know: no provider is obliged to accept an incoming transfer, so you need a destination that does. And whether your current provider moves the capital straight into an Altersvorsorgedepot also depends on the terms of your contract – ask them.

What switching costs

From 2027, after five years the transfer costs nothing at your old provider.

That is a rule, not goodwill – and it applies from 1 January 2027: if your contract was by then concluded more than five years ago, your current provider has to transfer the capital free of charge; within the first five years it may charge at most €150. For transfers up to the end of 2026 the old rule still applies: at most €150, whatever the age of your contract. On the other side, the receiving provider may charge a one-off administration fee of up to €150 for taking the money in – but no acquisition or distribution costs on the subsidised capital transferred. And the subsidy you have already received travels with it: your allowances and tax advantages stay yours.

Run the numbers with your balance

0 €

is what the old provider may charge for the transfer

from 2027, if your contract is more than five years old at the transfer

within the first five years, and up to the end of 2026: at most €150

Side by side

Riester and the Altersvorsorgedepot, criterion by criterion.

Riester contract

State subsidy
€175 basic allowance a year, plus €185 per child – €300 for a child born after 31 December 2007. You only get the full allowance if you pay the Mindesteigenbeitrag (the required own contribution); pay in less and it is cut pro rata. Anyone not yet 25 at the start of the contribution year gets a one-off €200 here too.
Tax deduction
Sonderausgabenabzug (special-expenses deduction) of up to €2,100 a year – that ceiling covers contributions and allowance together, so your own contribution counts only up to €2,100 minus your allowances. The tax office checks without an application whether the deduction beats the allowance for you.
Guarantee
At the start of the payout phase at least the contributions paid in have to be available. The provider has to cover that promise across the whole term, which limits the room for more volatile assets.
Equity exposure
Because the contribution guarantee has to be covered across the whole term, the equity share is limited – by how much depends on the product and the provider. Your own quota is in your Produktinformationsblatt (key information document).
Costs
What your contract costs depends on the product type – Riester exists as an insurance policy, as a bank savings plan and as a fund savings plan. With a unit-linked Riester annuity you pay twice: the costs of the policy and the costs of the funds inside it. The figure that sums both up is the Effektivkosten (effective costs) in your key information document.
Investment strategy
Which funds sit in your contract is as a rule set by the provider. You will find them in your key information document and in the annual statement.
Payout
If your contract provides for it, up to 30% of the capital can be paid out in one go at the start of the payout phase – that payment is taxed in full as sonstige Einkünfte (other income) at your personal rate. The rest has to run for life – as a lifelong annuity, or as a payout plan followed by a Teilkapitalverrentung (partial annuitisation) from age 85 at the latest. Only that annuitisation from 85 requires an insurer; with a bank or fund savings plan your provider pays the instalments before it itself.
Who is eligible
In essence employees covered by compulsory state pension insurance, plus civil servants.

Altersvorsorgedepot

State subsidy
Up to €540 basic allowance a year: 50 cents per euro on the first €360, then 25 cents per euro up to €1,800 – so the full €540 only at an own contribution of €1,800. Plus up to €300 per child, likewise contribution-dependent. Allowances start at an own contribution of €120 a year; anyone not yet 25 at the start of the contribution year gets a one-off €200 on top. Unlike the fixed Riester basic allowance, the allowance here hangs entirely on your contribution: pay in little and you get less than today’s €175.
Tax deduction
Sonderausgabenabzug of up to €1,800 of your own contributions a year, plus the allowance due on them – with the full basic allowance that is up to €2,340, and more with child allowances. The €1,800 is the cap on your own contribution, not on the deductible amount.
Guarantee
A contribution guarantee is not possible here at all: for the Altersvorsorgedepot the law rules out agreeing a minimum capital at the end of the savings phase or a minimum performance during it – more return potential, but price swings you have to be able to sit through.
Equity exposure
There is no such requirement here: the equity share follows your investment strategy. The standard depot contract works with two funds, and for the riskier one the law prescribes a glide path that reduces it towards the start of payouts – at most 50% five years before, at most 30% two years before and at the start. Those are the statutory default, not a rigid limit: you can ask for different percentages.
Costs
For the standard depot contract the legislator caps effective costs at 1.0%. Effective costs means: by how much the costs reduce your return up to the start of payouts. The cap does not apply to other Altersvorsorgedepot contracts.
Investment strategy
What may be bought is set by statute – among other things UCITS and open-ended retail AIFs up to risk class 5, plus certain government bonds. Here too the provider selects the investments unless you exercise a contractual option. With ETFs you can see at any time what is in the portfolio.
Payout
Payouts begin between 65 and 70. Here the payout plan may end: no earlier than age 85, and any residual capital is paid out then – a lifelong annuity is not required. Up to 30% can be taken in one go at the start if your contract provides for it; that payment too is taxed in full as sonstige Einkünfte at your personal rate. The rest stays invested.
Who is eligible
From 2027 also the self-employed and freelancers under 67 who have filed a tax return for the contribution year, and employed compulsory members of a professional pension scheme who have consented to the data transfer. The FAQ on the Altersvorsorgedepot page spells out who exactly.

Basis: the Altersvorsorgeverträge-Zertifizierungsgesetz (AltZertG, the certification act for pension contracts) and the Einkommensteuergesetz (EStG, the income tax act) in the version applying from 1 January 2027 (Altersvorsorgereformgesetz of 26 May 2026, BGBl. 2026 I Nr. 156). The Riester column describes the statutory minimum requirements, not a particular product from a particular provider. The Altersvorsorgedepot column describes the statutory rules – the effective-cost cap and the glide path those of the Standard-Depotvertrag – and not quirion’s product.

Self-check

Four figures from your contract, and you know more.

You don’t need an appointment for this decision, you need your last annual statement and your key information document. In them you will find:

  1. Effective costs per year

    In the key information document, often called the effective cost ratio or “reduction in yield”. It tells you how much return goes on costs – for comparison: the Altersvorsorgedepot’s standard depot contract stops at 1.0%.

  2. Balance and guaranteed benefit

    How much is in there today, and what pension is guaranteed for it? If the guaranteed pension surprises you, you are looking at what the guarantee costs.

  3. Total allowances received

    Stated in your provider’s annual certificate. Cancel and you repay that sum; transfer and it travels with you.

  4. Date the contract was concluded

    From 2027 the rule is: if your contract is more than five years old at the time of the transfer, the old provider has to transfer the capital free of charge; within the first five years it may charge at most €150. For transfers up to the end of 2026 the old rule applies – at most €150, whatever the age of the contract. The clock starts when the contract was concluded, not with your first contribution.

If you want to transfer: the termination that triggers it runs with three months’ notice to the end of a calendar quarter.

The Altersvorsorgedepot starts on 1 January 2027.

One thing we can already tell you: quirion will accept transfers from existing Riester contracts. That decision is made. Exactly how a transfer will work, and from when you can instruct one, depends on the certification of our contract – which cannot be granted before 1 January 2027. As soon as the process and the terms are settled we will publish them here, and anyone on the list hears it first. Until then, you can run the numbers.

Reserve your place for 2027

Whether a transfer is worthwhile for you depends on your contract, your eligibility for the subsidy and your investment goals. This page explains the rules of the Altersvorsorgereformgesetz of 26 May 2026 (BGBl. 2026 I Nr. 156) and is not investment advice. Reserving a place is non-binding and is not a contract.