North Star — Financial Independence Visualizer

Insight Personal Finance · anchored to the plan's portfolio at retirement. Each savings bucket affects FI differently because of how it's taxed.

Base Inputs — start here · enter values from the plan reports

Client Basics

Initial planned retirement age

Date of birth — month (1–12)

Date of birth — year

Today's month (1–12)

Today's year

Plan start year

Life expectancy (matches plan)

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Annual Contributions & Limits (2026 defaults)

Pre-tax 401(k) employee elective — current

Pre-tax 401(k) elective limit

Employer match — current $/yr

Voluntary after-tax 401(k) — current $/yr

Total 401(k) plan limit (415c, all sources)

Roth IRA — current $/yr

Roth IRA — annual limit

Brokerage savings — current $/yr

Brokerage has no IRS limit — enter what the client is currently saving into taxable accounts as part of the baseline plan.

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Roth lever caps at Roth IRA room + voluntary after-tax 401(k) room, since after-tax 401(k) dollars can be converted to Roth via the mega-backdoor pathway when the plan allows it.

Current Balances ($)

Pre-tax (401k + Trad IRA)

Roth (401k Roth + Roth IRA)

Brokerage (taxable)

Cash reserve

Plan Anchor — Portfolio at Planned Retirement Age

Pre-tax at retirement

Roth at retirement

Brokerage at retirement

Cash at retirement

Early Retirement Annual Spending (optional)

Early retirement annual spending (today's $, gross)

The GROSS annual portfolio withdrawal (today's $) during early-retirement bridge years — before Social Security and Pension kick in. Gross means including the taxes the portfolio funds, matching the plan anchor's basis. Pull from the planning software's Cash Flow report → Total Expenses in the first full retirement year, deflated to today's $. Each year of early retirement adds this to the FI Number. Leave at 0 to ignore the bridge cost. Everything else (house purchase, LTC, healthcare, lifestyle, SS, pension) is already in the plan anchor.

Plan-Assumed Returns (matches plan)

Return — Pre-tax (%)

Return — Roth (%)

Return — Brokerage (%)

Return — Cash (%)

These are the rates the planning software assumed for the portfolio. They drive the implied annual savings back-solve. The sliders in the "Return Assumptions" panel above are stress-tests on top of these.

Inflation & Tax Drag

Inflation rate (%)

Tax drag — Pre-tax (%)

Tax drag — Brokerage (%)

North Star Number — plan's target portfolio at retirement

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What-If Savings Levers

Move any slider to add monthly savings to that bucket — the numbers and chart below update in real time. Each $1 saved has a different impact on FI date because of how it'll be taxed later.

Extra to Pre-tax (401k / IRA)

$0/mo

$0$3,000/mo

Extra to Roth

$0/mo

$0$3,000/mo

Extra to Brokerage

$0/mo

$0$5,000/mo

Return Assumptions

Plan assumptions, not client behavior. Drag any slider to stress-test what happens if returns come in higher or lower than the plan expects.

Pre-tax (401k / IRA)

7.25%

4.0%10.0%

plan default: 7.0%

Roth

7.25%

4.0%10.0%

plan default: 7.0%

Brokerage

7.25%

4.25%10.25%

plan default: 7.25%

Cash

2.54%

0.00%5.54%

plan default: 2.54%

Chart shows accumulation only — the race to the North Star. The planning software handles what happens after retirement.

Current Balances

Pre-tax (401k / IRA)—

Roth (incl. mega-backdoor)—

Brokerage (taxable)—

Cash—

Total—

Projected at Retirement

Plan baselineWith lever

Pre-tax——

Roth (incl. mega-backdoor)——

Brokerage——

Cash——

Total——

Baseline shows account balances at planned retirement age. With-lever shows balances at the FI date achieved with current sliders.

Math Behind the Numbers — what the plan implies

The model back-solves these values from the plan anchor (the portfolio at retirement age in your planning software). Verifying these match your software's assumptions is the best sanity-check.

Implied annual real savings (today's $)

Pre-tax bucket—

Roth bucket—

Brokerage bucket—

Cash—

Total savings/yr (real)—

If this looks higher than the listed 401k / Roth contributions, the plan is funneling additional post-tax income into the brokerage bucket. This is the back-solved savings needed to reach the plan anchor at the current Plan-Assumed Returns.

Cost of retiring earlier than planned

Early-retirement annual spending (today's $)—

Each year of early retirement adds this much to the FI Number (in real terms). Edit the input above to adjust. Everything else (house purchase, LTC, healthcare, taxes, SS, pension) is already accounted for in the plan anchor — the calculator trusts the planning software for those.

How it works: The "North Star Number" comes from your planning software — it's the total portfolio at the planned retirement age, which has been validated to fund everything in the plan (one-time costs, LTC, healthcare, ongoing spending, taxes). The model back-solves the implied annual savings to each bucket from the difference between current and plan-retirement balances. For other retirement ages, the FI Number is scaled via an annuity formula using the plan's implied real net spending and the assumed real return. "After-tax dollars" applies the tax drag to each bucket: Roth × 1.0, Pre-tax × (1−PT drag), Brokerage × (1−BR drag), Cash × 1.0 — this represents the spendable value of the portfolio. FI Date = the earliest age at which the after-tax projected portfolio meets or exceeds the after-tax FI Number for retiring at that age.