Reading your forecast
Six tabs, and they do not always agree in the way you would expect. Here is what each one answers, and where the apparent contradictions come from.
The six tabs
Section titled “The six tabs”| Tab | The question it answers |
|---|---|
| Inputs | What is in the plan |
| Projections | What one possible future looks like, year by year |
| Cash Flow | Where the money went in a single year |
| Details | The same years as a table, with a year you can open in full |
| Outcomes | How often the plan works, across 1,000 futures |
| What-if | What a change would be worth, without making it |
Projections and Outcomes are the two worth your time first, and the quickstart says why. What-if comes after both, because it compares one Outcomes figure against another: see trying a change.
Today’s dollars
Section titled “Today’s dollars”Every tab except Inputs has a Today’s dollars switch, and it starts on.
With it on, every figure is shown in what it would buy today: $80,000 of spending in 2050 reads as $80,000, because that is the point of comparison you actually have. With it off, you get the literal dollar amounts of that year, so the same spending shows as whatever inflation has turned it into. Bigger number, less meaning, though it is the one a statement will eventually print.
The switch is per tab and resets when you leave. Flipping it on Projections does not move it on Details.
Why these two numbers do not match
Section titled “Why these two numbers do not match”The Projections line and the Outcomes percentage. Projections draws one simulated future, chosen because it landed at a particular percentile. Outcomes counts all 1,000 of them. So a line that hits zero in 2061 does not mean 2061 is the answer, it means one plausible future did that. Chance of success is the number to quote at people.
A year’s ending balance and the next year’s starting balance. In today’s dollars each year is adjusted for that year’s inflation, so the same pile of money is written a little smaller the following year. Turn Today’s dollars off and the two line up exactly.
The jagged line and the smooth fan. Same reason as the first one: one path against a thousand. The shuffle that plays when Projections loads is showing you fifteen neighbors of the path you ended up with, and it is worth watching once.
Opening a single year
Section titled “Opening a single year”Any row in the Details table opens that year in full: the rates that applied, income and spending, how the tax was worked out, and what was withdrawn from where. A number you distrust usually explains itself there.
Cash Flow answers the same question as a picture. Pick a year with the slider and it draws every dollar in and out of it, which is the fastest way to catch something entered twice, like a mortgage payment that is also sitting in your expenses.
When the tabs are blocked
Section titled “When the tabs are blocked”Projections, Cash Flow, Details and Outcomes need three things before anything can run: a birth month and year for each person, a state of residence, and a planning-till age at least 15 years past their current age. Inputs marks whichever one is missing.