FIRE & Retirement Calculator

When can you reach financial independence? Enter what you have, what you save, and what you'll spend in retirement - see the year your portfolio can fund your life on the 4% rule, plus your Coast FIRE number. Everything is in today's dollars (use a real, after-inflation return).

FIRE = Financial Independence, Retire Early. The goal is a portfolio big enough that it can cover your living costs indefinitely, so paid work becomes optional. The 4% rule is the rule of thumb for how big "big enough" is: withdraw 4% of the portfolio in your first retirement year and adjust that dollar amount for inflation each year after, and historically a stock/bond mix had a high chance of lasting about 30 years. Turned around, 4% means your target is 25× your annual spending (1 ÷ 0.04 = 25). The tabs below pressure-test that target - a Monte Carlo fan of outcomes, a backtest of the 4% rule through every market since 1928, and a dividend-reinvestment projection.

Your FI number

Years to FI

FI age

Coast FIRE number

FIRE style

Current age

yrs

Current invested assets

Monthly contribution

Annual spending in retirement

Expected return (real)

Safe withdrawal rate

Path to financial independenceFI number

Contributions Total balance (green above blue = growth) FI number (target)

Year-by-year projection

Age	Year	Contributed (yr)	Growth (yr)	Balance	% to FI

All figures are in today's dollars, so use a real (after-inflation) return - the long-run real return of a 100% stock portfolio has been ~7%, a 60/40 ~5%. The 4% rule (25× spending) comes from the Trinity study and assumes a ~30-year retirement; longer retirements or early retirement argue for 3.25–3.5%. Coast FIRE assumes a target retirement age of 65 and no further contributions. Excludes Social Security, pensions and taxes on withdrawals.

Monte Carlo Retirement Simulator

A single average return hides the risk. This runs 1,000 randomized market paths through your accumulation and retirement years - so instead of one tidy number you see the full fan of outcomes and the real probability your money lasts. Everything is in today's dollars (use a real return).

Chance money lasts

Median at retirement

Median at end

Unlucky case (10th %)

Current balance

Annual contribution

Years to retirement

yrs

Annual spending (retired)

Years in retirement

yrs

Mean return (real)

Volatility

1,000 paths, drawn from a normal return each year.

Fan of outcomestoday's dollars

10th–90th percentile 25th–75th percentile Median path

Each of 1,000 paths draws an independent annual return from a normal distribution with your mean and volatility, compounding the balance while adding contributions before retirement and subtracting spending after. "Chance money lasts" is the fraction of paths that never hit zero during retirement. Real markets have fat tails, autocorrelation and sequence risk that a normal distribution understates, so treat this as a guide, not a guarantee. Results are seeded so they're stable as you adjust inputs.

Safe Withdrawal Rate - The 4% Rule, Backtested

Would your retirement have survived the Depression, the 1970s stagflation, the dot-com bust and 2008? This runs your withdrawal plan through every historical starting year since 1928 using real S&P 500 and Treasury returns adjusted for actual inflation - the same rolling-period test behind the famous 4% rule.

Historical success rate

Periods tested

Median ending (real)

Worst case

Starting portfolio

Withdrawal rate

Retirement length

yrs

Stocks 60% / Bonds 40%

Try

Every historical retirement, overlaidtoday's dollars

Survived Ran out of money Median path - each line is one starting year's inflation-adjusted balance.

Uses annual S&P 500 total returns and 10-year US Treasury returns (Damodaran/NYU Stern) deflated by actual CPI inflation (BLS), 1928–2025. Each rolling period withdraws an inflation-adjusted amount from a portfolio rebalanced annually to your stock/bond mix; a period "fails" if the balance hits zero before the end. The 4% rule comes from the Trinity study; it held up across nearly all historical 30-year windows but is not guaranteed - future returns, longer retirements and a 2025-style starting valuation can differ. Ignores fees, taxes and Social Security.

Dividend Reinvestment (DRIP) Calculator

See the power of reinvesting dividends versus taking the cash - the income snowball that compounds share count over decades. Toggle the tax drag to see how much a taxable account loses to dividend taxes each year versus an IRA or 401(k).

Value (reinvested)

Total dividends

Reinvesting adds

Lost to tax drag

Initial investment

Dividend yield

Dividend growth /yr

Price appreciation /yr

Years

yrs

Dividend tax rate

Taxable account - apply dividend tax each year (uncheck for an IRA / 401(k))

Reinvest vs take the cash

Dividends reinvested Dividends taken as cash

Annual dividend income

The income snowball: dividends paid each year as your reinvested share count grows.

Models a starting price of $100/share scaled to your investment. Each year, dividends are paid on shares held (growing at the dividend-growth rate), taxed if the account is taxable, and the after-tax amount buys more shares at the year-end price. The cash path holds shares constant and accumulates after-tax dividends without reinvesting. Tax drag is the value a taxable account loses versus the same holding in a tax-advantaged account. Excludes share-price volatility, fees and dividend cuts; assumes dividends stay qualified.