Silanes of the general formula (1) R.sub.aSiH.sub.bX.sub.4-b-a (1) are prepared by disproportionating at least one more highly chlorinated silane in the presence of a homogeneous catalyst in an apparatus with at least one reactive distillation column and at least one additional reactor selected from among prereactors and side reactors, where R is an alkyl, aryl, alkaryl or haloalkyl radical, X is a halogen atom, a is 0 or 1, and b is 2, 3 or 4.