6. Spouse / PartnerOptional — capture spouse's income and life expectancy.
📊
7. Detailed AnalysisCharts, projections, CPP timing, scenarios, Monte Carlo.
📄
8. PDF ReportOne-click export at the end of the wizard.
💡 Look for the ⓘ icon at the top of each page for a quick blurb explaining that page. Hover or tap the small ? beside each field for in-depth help.
✅ Use Back / Next buttons to move between pages. Your inputs are kept in the browser only — they're cleared when you close the tab.
Important: This calculator is for personal planning and education only. It does not constitute financial, tax, or legal advice. Always consult a licensed financial planner or tax advisor before making major retirement decisions.
👤 Your Profile
Step 1
Where are you in your career?
This tells us whether to ask about ongoing savings on the next page.
💼Still Working
🌓Semi-Retired
🏖️Fully Retired
Personal details
Current age: —
90
2.5%
5%
💼 What you are currently saving
Step 2
Enter what you plan to contribute each year until you retire. The calculator will project your portfolio forward to your retirement age, then start drawing from it.
Combined household employment income (you + spouse if both working)
% per year · 2% = typical cost-of-living · 3–4% = career growth
Enter your annual employment income above and we'll calculate your CRA-maximum RRSP room (18% of earned income, up to the annual cap of ~$33,810 in 2026).
2025 CRA limit: $7,000/yr
Reinvest RRSP tax refund
RRSP contributions generate a tax refund each year. Toggle on to automatically reinvest it into your TFSA (up to room) then non-registered.
🏛️ Guaranteed Income
Step 3
🏛️ Your government benefits & pension
👫 These fields capture YOUR personal government benefits. Enter your own CPP, OAS and pension here. Your spouse's income is entered separately in the Spouse / Partner section — so the full household income is captured accurately.
From My Service Canada · 2025 max: ~$1,364/mo
2025 standard: ~$727/mo (40+ yrs residency)
📈 What you are currently worth
Step 4
Net Worth · auto-calculated
Assets (registered + non-registered + home + other + secondary) minus outstanding debt.
$0
Fill in the fields below to see your net worth.
Portfolio & assets
Enter numbers only — no $ signs or commas. Commas are added automatically.
Use Asset Allocation Glide Path
Blended return: —
Blended return: —
Return assumptions: 7.5% equity · 3.5% fixed income. The portfolio's blended return changes each year as the allocation shifts. After retirement, the target allocation is held constant. When enabled, this overrides the flat Investment Return field above.
0% (conservative) → 10% (aggressive)3%
🏠 I plan to downsize my home ?
At your chosen downsize age, the calculator sells your current home at its projected value, deducts selling costs, buys a smaller home worth the % you specify, and adds the freed equity to your non-registered portfolio. The smaller home keeps appreciating from there.
e.g. 60% = sell a $1M home, buy a $600K one
% of sale price · 5% is typical
I own a secondary property (cottage, rental, etc.) ?
Purchase price + improvements
3%
I have outstanding debts (mortgage balance, loans, etc.) ?
💰 Additional Savings During Retirement ?
If your guaranteed income (CPP + OAS + pension) exceeds your spending in any year, direct the surplus into these accounts to keep it compounding.
2025 annual limit: $7,000/yr
💸 Retirement Spending
Step 5
Three-phase spending
Unlike flat-spending models, this calculator recognises that spending naturally evolves across retirement. Set your expected annual spending for each phase. Enter combined household amounts (you + spouse).
🟢 Go-Go
Ages 65–75
🟡 Slow-Go
Ages 75–85
🔴 No-Go
Ages 85+
👥 Spouse / Partner
Step 6
Spouse details
Include spouse / partner income
Current age: 65
🧑🦽 Dependent Adult Child
Include dependent adult child costs
Enter the annual amount you provide to your dependent child. Government benefits (ODSP, etc.) flow directly to your child and are shown here for reference only.
ON ODSP max 2024: ~$1,228/mo
RDSP lifetime limit: $200,000
📊 Your Detailed Analysis
Step 7
—
Money lasts until
—
Max safe Go-Go spend
—
Est. estate at life exp.
Age 65Age 90
Tabs & charts
Source
Monthly
Annual
Green = portfolio value. Red dashed = annual spending. Shading shows Go-Go / Slow-Go / No-Go phases.
Portfolio valueAnnual spending
Comparing total lifetime CPP income at different start ages. ⭐ = highest total by your life expectancy.
Start Age
Monthly
Break-even vs 65
Total by Age 85
Total to Life Exp.
Portfolio survival under different market return assumptions.
📉 Market Crash
30%
Year 1
🔥 High Inflation
5%
Stress-tests your plan against thousands of randomised market years.
Click the button below to open a clean, printable summary in a new tab — every input, the income breakdown, the spending phases, the portfolio projection chart, and your Monte Carlo probability. Use your browser's Save as PDF option to download.
Tip: if the new tab is blocked, allow pop-ups for this page and try again.
Want to change something?
You can step back through any page to edit your inputs — results update instantly.
Reminder: This calculator is for personal planning and educational purposes only. It does not constitute financial, tax, or legal advice. Always consult a licensed financial planner or tax advisor before making major retirement decisions.
🍁 Finding Your CPP & OAS Numbers
CPP — Canada Pension Plan
Your CPP depends on how long and how much you contributed. Enter your amount as if starting at age 65 — the calculator adjusts up or down based on your chosen start age.
Option 1 — My Service Canada Account (most accurate)
💡 Enter CPP and OAS as your age-65 base amounts. Set your start ages to see the adjusted amounts used in all projections.
📉 Asset Allocation Glide Path
What is a glide path?
A glide path gradually shifts your portfolio from a higher equity allocation when you're younger to a more conservative mix as retirement approaches. The idea: dial down risk as your time horizon shortens, so a bad market year close to (or in) retirement doesn't blow up your plan.
How the calculator blends from Current to Target
Between now and your planned retirement age, the equity % moves linearly from Current Equity % to Target Equity %. Each year in the projection uses the blended return for that year's allocation.
After retirement, the target allocation is held constant for the rest of the projection.
Already retired? You can still use it
If you're already at or past your retirement age, set Current Equity % and Target Equity % to the same value. The portfolio will earn a steady blended return that matches your fixed mix.
Return assumptions
• Equity: 7.5% / yr (long-term Canadian/global equity blend, before inflation)
• Fixed income: 3.5% / yr (investment-grade bonds / GICs)
Each year's blended return = (equity % × 7.5%) + (fixed income % × 3.5%). When the glide path is enabled, this overrides the flat Investment Return field at the top of your profile.
💡 The Monte Carlo simulation also uses the glide path return as its central tendency when enabled — volatility still comes from the MC volatility slider.
🎲 What is a Monte Carlo simulation?
A Monte Carlo simulation is a way of stress-testing your retirement plan against thousands of different market futures — instead of just one.
The problem it solves
The other tabs in this calculator assume your investments earn the same return every single year — say, a steady 5%. That's a useful baseline, but it's not how markets actually behave. Real markets are bumpy: some years up 20%, some years down 15%, occasionally crashing 30% in a single year. Two retirees with the same long-term average return can end up in very different places depending on when the bad years happen relative to when they start withdrawing.
How it works
The simulator runs your plan from now until your life expectancy 1,000 times (or 500, or 5,000 — your choice). Each year of each run, it draws a random return from a normal distribution centred on your expected return, with year-to-year variation controlled by the volatility slider. Some runs get lucky sequences; some get unlucky ones. Then it counts: in how many of those 1,000 futures did your money outlast you?
Why it matters
Using only an average return can dramatically overstate how safe your plan is. A plan that looks fine on the deterministic projection can fail in 30% of realistic market scenarios. That 30% isn't a rounding error — it's the difference between a comfortable retirement and running out at 82.
Most professional retirement planners and financial-advisor tools use Monte Carlo for exactly this reason. It's the closest thing this calculator has to a real stress test.
How to read the result
90%+ Excellent — your plan survives in nine of ten realistic futures. Room to spend more or retire earlier.
80–89% Good — comfortable. The 10–20% of failures usually involve early, severe crashes; manageable with small adjustments.
65–79% Fair — thin margin. Worth tightening Slow-Go / No-Go spending, deferring CPP, or working a bit longer.
Below 65% At Risk — the plan fails in too many realistic futures. Time to revisit the levers — when to retire, how much to spend, when to draw CPP.
A small caveat
Monte Carlo assumes returns are independent year to year. Real markets show some mean reversion after big moves, which most studies suggest makes a plan slightly safer than this model implies. So if anything, your real-world odds are a touch better than the percentage shown — not worse.
💡 The volatility slider controls how bumpy each simulated year is. Bonds-heavy portfolio: ~8%. Balanced 60/40: ~12%. All-equity growth: ~18%. Higher volatility means a wider spread of outcomes — same average, more uncertainty.