MAKE ROOM FOR WHAT MATTERS
Plan your take-home pay, everyday costs and savings goals. Explore retirement too, using your own assumptions.
Start with your numbers ↓Explore your retirement →
This tool does not send field values, save them in browser storage or connect to accounts. Your browser may retain or restore entries, so refreshing or closing the page may not erase them. Avoid sensitive entries and downloads on shared devices. The hosting platform may process ordinary request information. A surrounding website has its own privacy policies.
01 / BUILD YOUR PLAN
Start here: add your take-home pay, regular bills and savings goals. Choose how often each amount happens; your monthly total updates as you type.
Use amounts after tax, in U.S. dollars. Enter 0 for a known zero; blank fields remain incomplete and count as zero in the estimate. Use a decimal point, without commas or currency symbols.
Calculate an annual wage estimate, then choose the income line it should replace. Apply it once; avoid entering the same wages or payroll deductions again elsewhere in your budget.
Applying copies an annual take-home amount into the selected budget line. Budget JSON and spreadsheets save that amount as a snapshot; they do not recalculate its taxes. Download the separate tax estimate to keep its assumptions. Budget clear, sample and restore actions leave these separate tax inputs unchanged.
“Review as” is optional. Choose a category only if you want the spending comparisons below. Changing a description does not change that category. Count each cost once.
Fictional sample loaded — these are illustrations, not suggested spending targets.
LOOK AHEAD / RETIREMENT
Could your savings and income cover retirement spending? Enter your ages, savings and expected spending, then compare three possible investment returns. Results update as you type; the budget above is optional.
Enter dollar amounts using what they would buy today, not larger future prices. Use 0 for an amount you do not expect, and enter percentages such as 2.5 without a % sign. Budget entries do not fill this planner automatically.
Copies editable yearly returns of 4%, 8% and 10%, plus 2.5% inflation and 0.25% fees. Your personal ages and amounts stay as entered. These are illustrations, not promised returns.
The label means 80% S&P 500 / 20% bonds. The 8% is a chosen assumption compounded yearly, before fees and inflation; it is not calculated from that mix. The model treats investments as one balance; it does not track two assets or rebalance them.
Fictional retirement example — these amounts, ages and returns are illustrations, not recommendations.
Requires a valid budget with no blank amounts. Copies spending and debt payments once, excluding savings goals. Review for retirement taxes, health costs and changing obligations; later budget edits do not update it.
Read this first: each card shows estimated investments when retirement starts, then whether they cover the spending you entered. A “spending shortfall” is money the model cannot cover. “None within this horizon” means no shortfall before your chosen end age; it is not a guarantee. All amounts use today’s buying power.
Compare all three scenarios, then inspect a birthday to see investments and any spending the model could not cover. The shaded area starts at your retirement age.
Scroll the table horizontally to compare all three scenarios on a smaller screen.
Charts are shareable with attribution. Credit David Tom Publishing and link to this calculator; preserve the calculation date, inputs, labels and assumptions. See Copyright & Reuse.
No form entries required. Complete the editable blue cells later; your website assumptions stay unchanged.
Includes your current retirement assumptions and editable formulas. No budget is required. Budget JSON files do not save retirement inputs; spreadsheet edits cannot be restored to this page. There is no automatic save.
The editable workbook calculates independently and may differ from the website at rounding boundaries or very large amounts. Keep the exact CSV when you need a record of the website results. The editable workbook displays percentages to two decimal places. For assumptions with more precision, check the formula bar or increase the displayed decimal places in your spreadsheet app.
A snapshot of all three scenarios and every modeled year, with monetary results to the cent. Import money columns as Text to preserve every digit. This CSV does not recalculate after edits.
All results use today’s purchasing power. Real return = (1 + nominal return) × (1 − annual fee) ÷ (1 + inflation) − 1. Contributions, spending, pensions and benefits keep pace with inflation. Fixed nominal pensions or benefits require a different assumption or model.
Growth occurs before year-end cash flows. Contributions stop at retirement. Pension and benefit income is counted only during retirement, from the chosen start age; income above spending is not reinvested. Investments stop at zero and uncovered spending is recorded separately. The first unfunded age is a modeled year-end age, not an exact depletion date. Balances are displayed in whole dollars, with positive amounts below $1 marked <$1; unfunded spending is shown to the cent. The website calculates balances without intermediate rounding. The exact CSV records each annual monetary result to the cent; the editable workbook uses its separate spreadsheet calculations.
These constant-return scenarios omit market volatility and the order of gains and losses, variable spending, contribution limits, account-specific tax rules, early-withdrawal penalties and investment taxes. Include expected withdrawal taxes in spending and use after-tax income. They do not recommend investments, a withdrawal rate or a retirement age, and they cannot guarantee future results.
03 / PUT THE NUMBERS IN VIEW
A color-coded view of the same monthly averages above. Each dollar appears once; savings goals are separate from spending. These charts show your base plan, not the hypothetical changes below.
04 / EXPLORE A WHAT-IF
Try a hypothetical monthly change. This does not alter the entries above or suggest which bills to reduce.
Only model changes you could realistically make. Preserve required and minimum payments; do not assume a debt payment can be reduced. A hypothetical reduction is not achieved savings.
05 / FIND ROOM TO REVIEW
These editable percentages of monthly take-home income are DTP illustrations, not official standards, lending limits or personalized affordability rules. Start with your household’s needs and local costs. Car payment is part of total transport; the targets and review amounts must not be added together.
Enter 0–100%, with up to two decimal places. Defaults: housing 30%, all food 15%, total transport 15%, car payment 10%. A complete plan with positive income is required for comparisons. Classifications are optional, but unclassified costs leave gaps.
Sources checked October 20, 2026. The example percentages above are DTP’s editable starting values, not percentages prescribed by these sources. This tool does not assess your eligibility for benefits, recommend a security or allocate your savings.
BEFORE YOU USE THE RESULT
If you include purchases in groceries, travel or another spending category, do not also count the payment of those same purchases as new spending. Include payments toward older credit-card debt separately. Savings transfers are planned allocations here, not extra spending.
Weekly amounts use 52 ÷ 12 and every-two-weeks amounts use 26 ÷ 12. Twice-monthly amounts use 2. Yearly bills use 1 ÷ 12. Your actual pay periods and bill dates can differ, so check cash available before each payment.
An unused balance is not an investment recommendation. Missing bills, variable income, upcoming obligations and the timing of your savings goals can change the picture. This is an educational planning tool, not personalized financial, tax or investment advice.
Amounts must be non-negative and have at most two decimal places. Each line is converted to a monthly average and rounded to the nearest cent, with halves rounded up; category totals add those rounded lines. Blank values count as zero but are flagged as incomplete. Savings goals are separate from spending and are included when calculating the remaining balance. Ratios are not calculated when income is zero.
There is no login, upload, automatic import, account connection, analytics library or local-storage feature in this standalone calculator. Do not enter account numbers or other identifiers in line-item labels. Any future connection or embedded version requires separate security and privacy review.