Personal finance in Saudi Arabia, and how to find the day your last instalment falls

This is a general explanation, not legal or financial advice. For the details of your contract and early settlement, ask your bank or finance company; the Saudi Central Bank (SAMA) is the regulator of lenders.

The limit the Saudi Central Bank sets on deductions

SAMA's Responsible Lending Principles for Individual Customers say that, for customers whose total monthly income is SAR 15,000 or less, monthly finance obligations linked to a deduction from salary must not exceed 33.33% of gross salary for employees and 25% for retirees. Total monthly obligations other than home finance must not exceed 45% of total monthly income. Higher incomes have their own limits in the same chapter.

"Gross salary" in those principles means the basic monthly salary after pension or GOSI contributions are deducted, plus all fixed allowances the employer pays monthly.

This is a limit the lender must respect when deciding to lend, not a comfortable level for your household. Being under it does not mean what is left is enough.

Step one: know your actual deduction

Open last month's payslip or bank statement and write down every amount that leaves automatically for financing. Then add what you pay yourself each month: store instalment plans, furniture finance, and anything you are repaying a relative.

A hypothetical example: an employee's basic salary after GOSI is SAR 8,500, with a SAR 2,500 housing allowance and a SAR 1,000 transport allowance, for a gross salary of SAR 12,000. The ceiling on finance deductions for them is about SAR 4,000. SAR 3,200 is deducted for a personal finance. They also pay SAR 450 for furniture finance, SAR 200 for an online store plan, and SAR 500 to a relative who lent them SAR 5,000. In all, SAR 4,350 goes out each month, leaving SAR 7,650 for the whole household.

Step two: write the final instalment date of each one

Draw a table with four columns: monthly payment, payments left, amount left (payment × payments), and date of the final payment. In the example, with the next payment due in November 2026:

The date that matters is the latest one in the last column: May 2029. That is the day your salary is free of instalments if nothing changes. If you do not know how many payments are left on a financing, ask the lender for a statement.

Step three: order the payoff and give every freed riyal a job

The basic rule: when a commitment ends, its payment does not drift back into spending. It moves to the next commitment.

In the example, the store plan ends in January 2027, freeing SAR 200 from February. Added to the repayments to the relative, that makes SAR 700 a month instead of 500, and that debt ends in June 2027 rather than August. From July, SAR 700 a month is free; from September the furniture payment joins it, making SAR 1,150.

That money does not go straight to the personal finance, because paying a financing early is governed by the contract. Put it into a separate account each month, ask the lender in writing for the amount needed to settle all or part of the financing and on what terms, and decide when the sum is there. Which order suits you best is a matter of temperament; what matters here is that every freed riyal has a destination written down in advance.

Before any new financing

Ask two questions. What will your deduction be after it, against the limit and against what your household needs? And where does the "final payment" date in your table move to? A new five-year financing erases May 2029 and writes a later date in its place, however small its payment looks.

Where Masareefy helps

In Masareefy you record each financing and store plan as a repeating payment with its amount, due day and number of payments. The app shows the payments left, the amount still owed and the expected date of the final payment, sets the month's instalments aside from your safe-to-spend figure from the first day, and reminds you on the due date. Money borrowed from a relative goes under loans with the lender's name, and each repayment is recorded against it. The separate early-settlement account can be a wallet you transfer into; a transfer between wallets is neither spending nor income. For instalment tracking in Saudi Arabia in general, see the Saudi debt and instalment tracker page. To compare your obligations with SAMA's limits, use the salary deduction ratio calculator.