Calculate your net worth

How to calculate your net worth

Calculating your net worth answers a single question: what would be left if you sold everything you own and repaid everything you owe? That remainder is your net worth. It differs from gross wealth, which adds up your assets without deducting loans — and which, on its own, says nothing about your real situation.

The formula fits on one line: net worth = assets − liabilities. The hard part is not the arithmetic, it is the inventory. People forget a life insurance policy opened ten years ago, count a flat at its purchase price rather than today's value, or use a loan's monthly payment instead of the outstanding capital. The calculator above avoids these mistakes by asking for the right figures in the right place.

Once you have the total, the next question comes on its own: is that a lot? The only honest comparison is with the median household of your age — not the average, which a few very large fortunes pull upward. Our article on wealth by age group explains how to read those figures without fooling yourself, and our benchmarks for net worth at 30 and at 40 cover the two decades where the gaps open up.

Four steps to estimate your net worth

1. 1

   Value property at market price

   Main home, second home, rental property: use the price it would sell for today, not what you paid. Public transaction records give a reliable estimate from recent sales in your area.

2. 2

   Add up savings and investments

   Savings accounts, current accounts, life insurance, share plans, brokerage accounts, pension savings, crypto. Take the surrender value or today's price. A life insurance policy counts for what it is worth now, not what you paid in.

3. 3

   Count other assets with resale value

   Vehicles, company shares, valuables. Many people leave them out for simplicity, and that is reasonable: they depreciate fast and weigh little. Include them only if they genuinely change the total.

4. 4

   Deduct debts at outstanding capital

   Mortgage, car loan, consumer credit, overdraft. The figure to use is the capital still to be repaid, shown on your amortisation schedule — never the monthly payment, never the amount originally borrowed.

Median net worth by age: France

The figures below come from ECB — Household Finance and Consumption Survey (HFCS) (2023-2024). They describe the middle household of each age group: half own less, half own more. These are the values the calculator compares your figure with; pick another country in the calculator to see its own.

Rounded figures, not adjusted for inflation since the survey. They hide wide gaps between owners and renters, between heirs and those starting from zero, between regions.

The calculation only has value when repeated. A net worth of €60,000 growing by €10,000 a year tells a better story than €150,000 standing still. To go further, our step-by-step guide to calculating your net worth walks through each stage with a worked example, the debt ratio measures how much of your assets is financed by credit, and a full wealth review gives you a method to repeat the exercise every year.

Frequently asked questions