Love this video. Think it's important to add a distinction as to which retirement calculators use an assumed or estimated tax rate and which ones take into account the type of accounts you have (IRA vs non IRA for example) and calculate taxes based on your actual sources of cash flow. Assumed rates can be significantly different than reality for retirees all depending on the types of savings and sources of cash they have.
Hi Rob. Great video! There are so many planners and calculators out there to try, that it's difficult to choose one. Please keep making your videos! Big fan!
Hello Rob, You may want to do a review of wealthtrace another DIY detailed retirement planner. Since you have done a fantastic job in analyzing these you may add that to the list so that the viewers knows what wealthtrace bring to the table,
I recently discovered you. Your advice is the best I’ve ever heard online. Thank you for this clip. I’m kind of a do it yourselfer So I’ll use one of the software packages. I tried the Personal Capital and it is good .They were not as helpful w my questions as they were at marketing their services to me. I will pay for New Retirement and try it.
Excellent Rob - As usual clear, concise, and to the point. I believe everyone should utilize at least two planners/claculators. I use two in addition to being a Vanguard Flagship member.
Ive tried a number of Retirement Calculators. Just a tiny adjustment to one of the variables (stock market return for example), and the final result can be up or down a $million. Big difference. On a positive note, the calculator will teach you about the miracle of compound growth.
Thank you for the excellent content Rob. Questions: 1. Have you tested or reviewed Wealthtrace? Have you reviewed or tested Pralana Gold for retirement planning. Both are software that get referred to among the Boglehead community. More chatter is related to Prallana Gold. I'd be very curious as to what your input would be on these programs. Thank you, sir.
I learned about New Retirement from your website article and signed up for the premium access. It’s a very pretty tool but there are a lot of aspects of it that are very frustrating. For starters it’s the only tool I’ve seen that focuses on future value. I understand that money is inflated in the future but it’s hard to grasp how much $8M is in 2074, today. Yes I can run a reverse calculation but the whole program is setup that way. Future income, savings, expenses are all inflated. It’s confusing to see I’ll have $350k in expenses when I am 70 then have to remind myself that it’s really $90k or something. It also models, at least for me, a 2-5 period near my wife’s end of life where she suddenly is millions of dollars short but then has our estate ending with $10M. Why wouldn’t it use the massive amount left in the estate to pay the shortage? I really wish there was a future value toggle.
For next video you might want to include The Complete Retirement Planner - makes it easy to create a comprehensive financial plan and one of the best retirement planning tools out there (per U.S. News & World Report).
I recently found your videos and think they are very well done and thought provoking. I’m especially interested in asset allocation in retirement (equity vs bonds), but curious if the calculator projections take into account the recent under performance in bonds when evaluating the right future allocation returns. With current bond yields so low and interest rates only having one way to go, it’s hard to justify the role bonds play in future returns.
Thank you Rob for these great retirement tools what a cost saver. I was fixated on Rightcapital which is not for a novice person. Personal Capital was simple to link accounts it took me like 15 minutes to link 5 accounts.
Another free tool is the Flexible Retirement Planner. You can enter inflation rates, return rates, sources of income in retirement (SS, part time job, etc.), and enter your investing style, or a custom style. Very good for free!
Can you recommend a software or website that I can use to calculate what if's on stocks and ETF's over time. I'm looking at setting up a retirement income stream. I'm already retired and have a mixed up portfolio now, I would like to consolidate it into several dividend income stock to ad to my SS income. New here but so far, love your videos
Well, the are basically the same thing, with VTI being an ETF and VTSAX a mutual fund. If I were buying them through Vanguard, I generally go with the mutual fund to avoid the premium /discounts of an ETF. If I were buying at another brokerage, I'd go with the ETF to avoid fees. That said, with these types of funds that are highly traded, it doesn't much matter in my opinion.
@@rob_berger Thanks for the reply! But is there a higher risk with mutual funds being actively managed and changed by someone? I only ask since people like Warren Buffet constantly say that you can’t beat the market I don’t see why I wouldn’t want a passively managed ETF rather than an actively managed mutual fund. I’d appreciate your input on that. Thank you so much
Rob, your channel has been incredibly helpful and informative. Many thanks for providing this content. I'm trying to figure out if you've done any videos discussing small cap tilting (blend or value) versus a total market portfolio?
Thank you! Not specifically, although I've talked about a 6-fund portfolio that would include small cap. I'll add a video on small/value to my list of future topics.
Rob, I'm very late to the party, but thought I would leave my thoughts after having tried Personal Capital, New Retirement, On Trajectory and, (not reviewed) MaxiFi. If you put video's together on New Retirement and On Trajectory, my opinions may change, but here are my thoughts... (1) Personal Capital is free, easy, automated, but high level and leaves me wondering if I missed anything (you get what you pay for...). But I really like the interface and use it as a proxy for retirement. (2) New Retirement: ambitious & attractive output, but difficult to set up. The platform couldn't load my 3rd 529 account for some reason, though it was from the same plan as the other two. I didn't like the layout of the accounts (would be nice to segregate these by cash, retirement, education, etc...). Overall, not sure why they charge $120 per year. Canceled my free trial within an hour. (3) On Trajectory: VERY glitchy. Gave up after spending 30 mins setting up. Want to link more than one account at an institution? You'll need to "re-apply" for every single account. It's onerous and unnecessary. Also, they want more $$$ if you link more than 2 accounts. Not worth the money and trouble. (4) MaxiFi: Lots of detail that needs to be loaded. $120 investment. BUT, the most thorough of any of the aforementioned platforms, and recommends ways to maximize your retirement income. Interface is not attractive, but I'm not in the market for a pretty graph. Just want to know where I might land ___ years from now.
Why doesn’t years to retirement go up instead of down when go up on withdrawal rate? I imaging if withdrawing more the money runs out faster and you have to work longer?
Hi Rob , thank you for your videos. I look forward to your videos. I bought 3 funds VOO ,VTI , VYM . I know they overlap . Which fund should I get rid off.
Check out the annual return of VOO and VTI. VTI ever so slightly outperforms VOO (In most years) and is more diverse. I had SPY (the same as VOO) and sold it to buy VTI.
Hello Mr Berger, I'm at the beginning of your "5 Best...Planners" blog. Are any of the products you are evaluating available as a downloadable and subsequently available as web free software in case the companies discontinue doing business or their annual cost becomes prohibitive? Thank You, Daniel
One question I have on Personal Capital is with the retirement spending. If I enter 120,000 annual spending, does that take into account social security or is that all coming from my retirement accounts. If I expect $30,000 per year from social security, would I be taking 90,000 our of my retirement or would that give me 150,000 total spending for the year?
They allow you to enter income and spending separately. So you would have one income item for social security and then a separate spending item for your annual spending.
Personal Capital is now called Empower....and they require you to link an account. I could not opt out. There isn't any way any of these tools will get me link an account. Might be time for you to do an update on these types of tools, if you haven't already. I paid for New Retirement and I find it confusing without a lot of explanation in the tool to tell me how data in one area might be pulled into another. I attended what I thought was a how to class....but it ended up being a question and answer session for others who are already deep into the tool. Not for a beginner, where I might need a little more hand holding to get the info in there and explanation as to if I put it in one spot, I don't have to put it in again in another. I am a bit chagrined I paid $100 for this....and I would have to pay a person to walk me through the tool again. Money kinda wasted.
I had the same problem! I'm guessing 99% of the people that Rob is referring to Empower don't want to do this, and hence never get into the system. If Rob is reading this, you might want to update your video to remove Empower altogether. I have been playing with the free version of NewRetirement, which seems decent, but many functions are not available in the free version.
Hi Rob, I just started watching your videos and they've been extremely helpful! Are you from Ohio? Just asking because I saw an Ohio State Buckeyes cap in one of your videos. I'm from southeastern Ohio. Anyway, is there a video where you talk about standard deviation and what a good standard deviation is? In other words, what is the range?
Always glad to hear from another Buckeye! I've talked about standard deviation in videos, but no video dedicated to that topic. I don't really see it as a good or bad factor. The real question is volatility (which is what standard deviation measures) compared to expected return. Stocks have high volatility, but we accept that b/c of the higher expected return. But I can certainly cover this in future videos.
it appears the personal capital planner accepts anything but linked accounts. I am not ready to do that yet. Do you know if there is a workaround for this apparent limitation of this free tool?
Rob-I'm very disappointed that Empower insists on having a new user link their brokerage accounts by asking for usernames and passwords. Truly wrong. BIG thumbs down. Thanks for your efforts and sharing. Thumbs up.
I guess I’m a little confused about personal capital. The software doesn’t allow you to input your monthly payments on debts (I guess unless you link the accounts you use to make those payments). Which I’m not willing to do at this point. And the “retirement planning” section doesn’t appear to have any capability to handle Roth conversions and the tax consequences of conversions. Please point out if I’m wrong. Thanks for your time.
I do think you need to link bank accounts to track cashflows, including debt payments. If you want to enter transactions manually, Quicken is probably a better option. And if you want to model roth conversions, New Retirement is a better option.
@rob_berger I recently retired after being in IT for a broker-dealer for 37+ years. If they have any kind of audit trail -- and they should-- then once you've linked your account, they've got the info in their history audit trail. If you're going to do this, you'd do well to change the password on your account every single time. Love your channel BTW. Thanks for all the excellent advice.
Here's the article with more details on the retirement planners mentioned in the video: robberger.com/best-retirement-calculators/
Are you aware of any tools that incorporate cash value whole life insurance for retirement income as well?
Love this video. Think it's important to add a distinction as to which retirement calculators use an assumed or estimated tax rate and which ones take into account the type of accounts you have (IRA vs non IRA for example) and calculate taxes based on your actual sources of cash flow. Assumed rates can be significantly different than reality for retirees all depending on the types of savings and sources of cash they have.
Hi Rob. Great video! There are so many planners and calculators out there to try, that it's difficult to choose one. Please keep making your videos! Big fan!
Hello Rob, You may want to do a review of wealthtrace another DIY detailed retirement planner. Since you have done a fantastic job in analyzing these you may add that to the list so that the viewers knows what wealthtrace bring to the table,
I recently discovered you. Your advice is the best I’ve ever heard online. Thank you for this clip. I’m kind of a do it yourselfer So I’ll use one of the software packages. I tried the Personal Capital and it is good .They were not as helpful w my questions as they were at marketing their services to me. I will pay for New Retirement and try it.
Did you try New Retirement and if so, how did you like it?
Excellent Rob - As usual clear, concise, and to the point. I believe everyone should utilize at least two planners/claculators. I use two in addition to being a Vanguard Flagship member.
Is New Retirement useful for a Canadian user? If not, what do you suggest? Thanks for all the good info you share in these videos.
Ive tried a number of Retirement Calculators. Just a tiny adjustment to one of the variables (stock market return for example), and the final result can be up or down a $million. Big difference.
On a positive note, the calculator will teach you about the miracle of compound growth.
You’re absolutely correct. I’d encourage you to use tools that take a more thoughtful approach to this type of analysis. 😉
Exactly what I say after using these tools
Thank you for the excellent content Rob. Questions: 1. Have you tested or reviewed Wealthtrace? Have you reviewed or tested Pralana Gold for retirement planning. Both are software that get referred to among the Boglehead community. More chatter is related to Prallana Gold. I'd be very curious as to what your input would be on these programs. Thank you, sir.
I learned about New Retirement from your website article and signed up for the premium access. It’s a very pretty tool but there are a lot of aspects of it that are very frustrating. For starters it’s the only tool I’ve seen that focuses on future value. I understand that money is inflated in the future but it’s hard to grasp how much $8M is in 2074, today. Yes I can run a reverse calculation but the whole program is setup that way. Future income, savings, expenses are all inflated. It’s confusing to see I’ll have $350k in expenses when I am 70 then have to remind myself that it’s really $90k or something. It also models, at least for me, a 2-5 period near my wife’s end of life where she suddenly is millions of dollars short but then has our estate ending with $10M. Why wouldn’t it use the massive amount left in the estate to pay the shortage? I really wish there was a future value toggle.
You can change that parameter to 'Today's Dollars' under the Assumptions menu on the upper right. Very easy to do
For next video you might want to include The Complete Retirement Planner - makes it easy to create a comprehensive financial plan
and one of the best retirement planning tools out there (per U.S. News & World Report).
Looking to purchase either New Retirement software or The Complete Retirement Planner. TCRP has worked well for you?
Thanks.
I recently found your videos and think they are very well done and thought provoking. I’m especially interested in asset allocation in retirement (equity vs bonds), but curious if the calculator projections take into account the recent under performance in bonds when evaluating the right future allocation returns. With current bond yields so low and interest rates only having one way to go, it’s hard to justify the role bonds play in future returns.
Thank you Rob for these great retirement tools what a cost saver. I was fixated on Rightcapital which is not for a novice person. Personal Capital was simple to link accounts it took me like 15 minutes to link 5 accounts.
Another free tool is the Flexible Retirement Planner. You can enter inflation rates, return rates, sources of income in retirement (SS, part time job, etc.), and enter your investing style, or a custom style. Very good for free!
Thank you. It looks like a worthwhile download.
Can you recommend a software or website that I can use to calculate what if's on stocks and ETF's over time. I'm looking at setting up a retirement income stream. I'm already retired and have a mixed up portfolio now, I would like to consolidate it into several dividend income stock to ad to my SS income. New here but so far, love your videos
Excellent video, very helpful. Will you be doing a review of Maxifi?
Can you make a video explaining VTI vs VTSAX? Please I'm going to begin my ROTH soon and would value your opinion. Thank you.
Well, the are basically the same thing, with VTI being an ETF and VTSAX a mutual fund. If I were buying them through Vanguard, I generally go with the mutual fund to avoid the premium /discounts of an ETF. If I were buying at another brokerage, I'd go with the ETF to avoid fees. That said, with these types of funds that are highly traded, it doesn't much matter in my opinion.
@@rob_berger Thanks for the reply! But is there a higher risk with mutual funds being actively managed and changed by someone? I only ask since people like Warren Buffet constantly say that you can’t beat the market I don’t see why I wouldn’t want a passively managed ETF rather than an actively managed mutual fund. I’d appreciate your input on that. Thank you so much
Rob, your channel has been incredibly helpful and informative. Many thanks for providing this content. I'm trying to figure out if you've done any videos discussing small cap tilting (blend or value) versus a total market portfolio?
Thank you! Not specifically, although I've talked about a 6-fund portfolio that would include small cap. I'll add a video on small/value to my list of future topics.
Rational Reminder podcast/Ben Felix Common Sense investing has some really great and informative factor content.
I tried Personal Capital but I like New Retirement better.
Rob, I'm very late to the party, but thought I would leave my thoughts after having tried Personal Capital, New Retirement, On Trajectory and, (not reviewed) MaxiFi. If you put video's together on New Retirement and On Trajectory, my opinions may change, but here are my thoughts... (1) Personal Capital is free, easy, automated, but high level and leaves me wondering if I missed anything (you get what you pay for...). But I really like the interface and use it as a proxy for retirement. (2) New Retirement: ambitious & attractive output, but difficult to set up. The platform couldn't load my 3rd 529 account for some reason, though it was from the same plan as the other two. I didn't like the layout of the accounts (would be nice to segregate these by cash, retirement, education, etc...). Overall, not sure why they charge $120 per year. Canceled my free trial within an hour. (3) On Trajectory: VERY glitchy. Gave up after spending 30 mins setting up. Want to link more than one account at an institution? You'll need to "re-apply" for every single account. It's onerous and unnecessary. Also, they want more $$$ if you link more than 2 accounts. Not worth the money and trouble. (4) MaxiFi: Lots of detail that needs to be loaded. $120 investment. BUT, the most thorough of any of the aforementioned platforms, and recommends ways to maximize your retirement income. Interface is not attractive, but I'm not in the market for a pretty graph. Just want to know where I might land ___ years from now.
I see a lot CFPs use right capital planning but geared to the pros & cost $100 per month!
Hi Rob, I am a regulær followers of your Channel. Can you please do a video with 3 or 4 fund etf retirement portfolio for investors in Europe.
I will. Until then, this resource may be helpful: www.bogleheads.org/wiki/EU_investing
This was a fantastic review...thank you
How do you manually input your amount with Capital without brokerage account info?
Why doesn’t years to retirement go up instead of down when go up on withdrawal rate? I imaging if withdrawing more the money runs out faster and you have to work longer?
Hi Rob , thank you for your videos. I look forward to your videos. I bought 3 funds VOO ,VTI , VYM . I know they overlap . Which fund should I get rid off.
Well, VOO and VTI probably overlap the most of the three.
Check out the annual return of VOO and VTI. VTI ever so slightly outperforms VOO (In most years) and is more diverse. I had SPY (the same as VOO) and sold it to buy VTI.
Hello Mr Berger,
I'm at the beginning of your "5 Best...Planners" blog. Are any of the products you are evaluating available as a downloadable and subsequently available as web free software in case the companies discontinue doing business or their annual cost becomes prohibitive? Thank You, Daniel
Take a look at the retirement budget calculator
One question I have on Personal Capital is with the retirement spending. If I enter 120,000 annual spending, does that take into account social security or is that all coming from my retirement accounts. If I expect $30,000 per year from social security, would I be taking 90,000 our of my retirement or would that give me 150,000 total spending for the year?
They allow you to enter income and spending separately. So you would have one income item for social security and then a separate spending item for your annual spending.
Personal Capital is now called Empower....and they require you to link an account. I could not opt out. There isn't any way any of these tools will get me link an account. Might be time for you to do an update on these types of tools, if you haven't already. I paid for New Retirement and I find it confusing without a lot of explanation in the tool to tell me how data in one area might be pulled into another. I attended what I thought was a how to class....but it ended up being a question and answer session for others who are already deep into the tool. Not for a beginner, where I might need a little more hand holding to get the info in there and explanation as to if I put it in one spot, I don't have to put it in again in another. I am a bit chagrined I paid $100 for this....and I would have to pay a person to walk me through the tool again. Money kinda wasted.
I had the same problem! I'm guessing 99% of the people that Rob is referring to Empower don't want to do this, and hence never get into the system. If Rob is reading this, you might want to update your video to remove Empower altogether. I have been playing with the free version of NewRetirement, which seems decent, but many functions are not available in the free version.
thanks!
Hi Rob, I just started watching your videos and they've been extremely helpful! Are you from Ohio? Just asking because I saw an Ohio State Buckeyes cap in one of your videos. I'm from southeastern Ohio. Anyway, is there a video where you talk about standard deviation and what a good standard deviation is? In other words, what is the range?
Always glad to hear from another Buckeye! I've talked about standard deviation in videos, but no video dedicated to that topic. I don't really see it as a good or bad factor. The real question is volatility (which is what standard deviation measures) compared to expected return. Stocks have high volatility, but we accept that b/c of the higher expected return. But I can certainly cover this in future videos.
What about projection lab
it appears the personal capital planner accepts anything but linked accounts. I am not ready to do that yet. Do you know if there is a workaround for this apparent limitation of this free tool?
does any of these softwares work for Canadians? integrated registered account options, tax rates, etc
Thanks Rob
NewRetirement does have robust tools, however some of what you showed is not in the free version.
He states at the beginning of the video it’s not free.
It looks like Personal Capital has recently changed. They will not let me do anything at the site without first linking an account.
Best to stay away from PC. They will also spam call and email you now.
Rob-I'm very disappointed that Empower insists on having a new user link their brokerage accounts by asking for usernames and passwords. Truly wrong. BIG thumbs down. Thanks for your efforts and sharing. Thumbs up.
Yikes. Not happening.
I was excited to try as well but linking not happening for me either.
I guess I’m a little confused about personal capital. The software doesn’t allow you to input your monthly payments on debts (I guess unless you link the accounts you use to make those payments). Which I’m not willing to do at this point.
And the “retirement planning” section doesn’t appear to have any capability to handle Roth conversions and the tax consequences of conversions.
Please point out if I’m wrong.
Thanks for your time.
I do think you need to link bank accounts to track cashflows, including debt payments. If you want to enter transactions manually, Quicken is probably a better option. And if you want to model roth conversions, New Retirement is a better option.
Love your videos! but how do you toggle between yourself and the screen like that? Please share your secret!
I use the Roland VR-1HD video streamer. amzn.to/3CuDJ4e
@@rob_berger Sweet, thank you so much!!! That's at least 5 VTIs!!!
For Personal Capital, you have to link at least one account to use the tool. So *free* if you are willing to do that. Can't use the tool otherwise.
If you link the account and then unlink it, you should be fine. That's worked for me with the demo account I use on the show.
@rob_berger I recently retired after being in IT for a broker-dealer for 37+ years. If they have any kind of audit trail -- and they should-- then once you've linked your account, they've got the info in their history audit trail.
If you're going to do this, you'd do well to change the password on your account every single time.
Love your channel BTW. Thanks for all the excellent advice.