Inventory and Closing Stock for Sole Proprietors

The basic rule: cash-basis accounting

A sole proprietor taxed under vállalkozói szja, with itemized cost deduction, records revenue and costs on a cash basis: money spent on materials or goods counts as a fully deductible cost in the tax year you pay for it, regardless of when you actually sell or use that stock. This is a meaningful difference from double-entry corporate accounting, where a change in inventory shows up directly in the profit and loss statement. As a sole proprietor, in an ordinary tax year, the size of what's sitting in your stockroom doesn't by itself affect your tax base.

When do you need to keep a leltár?

A leltár, the quantity and value record of your goods and materials stock, is one of the subsidiary records named in the Szja tv.'s annex 5, and it's only required when it's actually relevant. That's typically the case if you use itemized cost deduction and hold goods for resale, or unused materials, for your business. As an átalányadó (flat-rate) taxpayer you never need a leltár, because your tax base is set by the statutory cost ratio, not by your actual, leltár-substantiated costs.

When inventory does become taxable revenue

Although a stock's value isn't revenue in an ordinary tax year, the law treats the closing-stock value of a previously deducted cost as revenue in two specific situations.

When you close the business

If you cease your sole proprietor activity, the return for the closing tax year must include, as additional business revenue:

• the closing-stock (leltár) value of goods and materials that were already expensed as a cost and are still on hand at closure, and
• the closing-stock value of fixed assets under 200,000 HUF in individual value, which were expensed in full rather than depreciated.

The logic is straightforward: you already claimed the cost when you bought the stock, but it never generated matching revenue through a sale before you closed the business. The law settles that gap once, at closure, so a deducted cost doesn't permanently go unmatched on the revenue side. For more on winding down, see Pausing or Closing a Sole Proprietorship?

When you switch tax regimes

If you were taxed under vállalkozói szja and then switched to átalányadó or the kata flat tax, the value of your stock at the time of the switch is recorded, but it doesn't increase your tax base yet, since neither átalányadó nor kata bases your tax on actual costs. If you later switch back to vállalkozói szja, that recorded stock value shows up as additional revenue in the year you switch back. If you're unsure whether átalányadó or vállalkozói szja fits your business better, our calculator compares the two using your own numbers.

In practice: what this means for your records

Because a closing-stock value only becomes a tax question at these specific moments, you don't need a continuously maintained, line-by-line inventory ledger to comply with the law. A single, accurate count, by quantity and value, at the relevant moment, is enough: as of the closing date, or at the point you switch tax regimes. That count is what the leltár records, and it's what you use when preparing the return for the tax year the closure or the switch falls in.

This article is for general information only and does not constitute tax advice. Source: the Personal Income Tax Act, 1995. évi CXVII. törvény, § 49/B and annex 5 (net.jogtar.hu), and NAV information booklet no. 3, "Egyéni vállalkozók szja- és járulékkötelezettsége" (2026. 02. 20.).

Last updated: July 31, 2026.