What this cannot tell you

The optimizer uses almost all tax and social security benefits in the calculation process. Your results page shows the limits that apply to you.

Details on how we calculate

We assume your investments grow by the same amount every year, which real markets never do. Your plan will show what a bad first ten years would cost you, and what it costs if the bad years come first rather than last, but we do not build a separate plan for every path the market could take.
The plan spends down to the age you pick. Living longer than that is the risk this tool cannot see, so try a few ages and look at the spread.
Your plan uses current tax rules for every year, increasing with inflation except for those frozen by legislation. The rules themselves will likely change, and nobody can predict how. We check for tax changes regularly and update these rules when governments publish them.
RetOpt does not give tax, investment or financial advice.

Details on what we assume or omit

Canada

We work out the federal and provincial tax returns in full, with CPP, OAS and the Guaranteed Income Supplement. What we leave out:

Health care

Quebec. The Quebec prescription drug insurance premium is not included. If you are covered by the public plan rather than a private one, you will pay up to $766 a year more than this plan shows, per adult, so treat the estate as that much optimistic.

Government benefits

Across Canada. The Guaranteed Income Supplement and the Allowances are worked out for every year of your plan. One rule is left out: when you stop working, Service Canada can pay GIS on an estimate of your income after you stop, instead of last year's. Whether it can take some of that back later is before the courts, so the plan counts last year's income, and in the year or two after you stop you may be paid more GIS than it shows.
Alberta. We count the Alberta Seniors Benefit at the rate for people who own or rent their home. If you live somewhere you pay no rent, or in a continuing care home, Alberta pays a different amount, and this plan does not show it.
Alberta. Alberta pays its Seniors Benefit on last year's income. In your plan's first year we use what you told us about last year's income for GIS, which Alberta measures a little differently, so that year can be off by a little. Alberta can also pay a first-time applicant on an estimate of this year's income after a drop; the plan uses last year's.
Manitoba. Manitoba's 55 PLUS benefit is counted on the same income and in the same years as GIS. Manitoba's own tables pay it in steps, and the plan draws a straight line under them, so it can show up to $7 a year less than Manitoba pays.
New Brunswick. New Brunswick's Low-Income Seniors' Benefit is counted from the plan's second year, the year after one the plan shows you on GIS; whether you can claim it in the first year depends on last year, which the plan does not know.
Nova Scotia. Nova Scotia refunds the provincial tax of anyone who received the Guaranteed Income Supplement in the year, and the plan counts it; but where that tax is under $50 Nova Scotia pays $50, and the plan pays only the tax, so in such a year you get a little more than it says.
Nunavut. Nunavut's Senior Citizen Supplementary Benefit, paid monthly to someone who gets the Guaranteed Income Supplement, is not counted. In a year the plan shows you on GIS you would get more than it says, and the year your income rises past the GIS line costs you that benefit as well.
Saskatchewan. Saskatchewan's Seniors Income Plan is counted, but not its $15 minimum payment: in the last few hundred dollars of income before it stops, you would get up to $15 a month more than the plan says.
Yukon. The Yukon Seniors Income Supplement, paid monthly to someone who gets the Guaranteed Income Supplement, is not counted. In a year the plan shows you on GIS you would get more than it says.

Tax credits

British Columbia. The BC renter's tax credit is not modeled. If you rent your home it pays up to $400 a year, less 2% of family income over $64,764 on the 2025 return, so it is gone at about $85,000. The BC sales tax credit, $75 for you and $75 for a spouse, is not modeled either, and it is gone by $18,750 of income for a single person and $25,500 of family income for a couple. If either reaches you, you receive more than this plan shows, so the estate is a little low rather than a little high.
Manitoba. Manitoba's Family Tax Benefit is not modeled. It is a credit of 10.8% on $2,065 for you, $2,065 more if you are 65 or older, and $2,065 for a spouse with little income of their own, less 9% of your net income: up to $223 a year under 65 and $446 from 65. So it reaches someone under 65 up to about $23,000 of income, and someone 65 or older up to about $46,000. If your income is in that range, this plan shows a little more Manitoba tax than you will pay, so the estate is a little low rather than a little high.
Manitoba. The Manitoba personal tax credit is not modeled; it is income-tested and paid outside the provincial return. You may receive more than this plan shows, so the estate is a little low rather than a little high.
New Brunswick. New Brunswick's low-income tax reduction is not modeled. On the 2025 return it is worth up to $802 for you and $802 more for a spouse, and it shrinks by 3 cents for every dollar of family income over $21,920, so it reaches a single person up to about $49,000 of income and a couple up to about $75,000. If your income is in that range, this plan shows more New Brunswick tax than you will pay, so the estate is low rather than high.
Newfoundland and Labrador. Newfoundland and Labrador's low-income tax reduction is not modeled. On the 2025 return it is worth up to $997 for you and $557 more for a spouse, and it shrinks by 16 cents for every dollar of family income over $23,928 for a single person or $40,460 for a couple, so it reaches a single person up to about $30,000 of income and a couple up to about $50,000. If your income is in that range, this plan shows more Newfoundland and Labrador tax than you will pay, so the estate is low rather than high.
Northwest Territories. The Northwest Territories cost of living tax credit is not modeled. It is refundable, so it is paid even in a year with no tax to offset, and it is not small: up to $942 a year for each person, the full amount from $66,000 of income, with a supplement for low incomes. You receive more than this plan shows, so the estate is low rather than high.
Nova Scotia. Nova Scotia's low-income tax reduction is not modeled. It is worth up to $300 for you and $300 more for a spouse, and it shrinks by 5 cents for every dollar of family income over $15,000, so it is gone at $21,000 of income for a single person and $27,000 for a couple. If your income is under that, this plan shows a little more Nova Scotia tax than you will pay, so the estate is a little low rather than a little high.
Nunavut. The Nunavut cost of living tax credit is not modeled. It is refundable, so it is paid even in a year with no tax to offset, and it is not small: 2% of each person's income, up to $1,500 a year each, the full amount from $75,000 of income. You receive more than this plan shows, so the estate is low rather than high.
Ontario. The Ontario Trillium Benefit, which includes the Ontario sales tax credit and the energy and property tax credit, and the Ontario senior homeowners' property tax grant are not modeled; all are income-tested and paid outside the provincial return. They are not small: a senior who pays rent or property tax can receive over $1,000 a year from the energy and property tax credit alone, and it fades only slowly as income rises. It turns on your rent or property tax, which this plan does not ask, so the estate it shows is low rather than high.
Prince Edward Island. Prince Edward Island's low-income tax reduction is not modeled. It is worth $350 for you and $350 more for a spouse, plus $250 for each of you born in 1960 or earlier, and it shrinks by 5 cents for every dollar of family income over $23,000 from 2026 ($22,650 on the 2025 return). So it reaches a single person up to about $30,000 of income, or $35,000 from 65, and a couple up to about $37,000, or $47,000 if you are both 65 or older. If your income is in that range, this plan shows more Prince Edward Island tax than you will pay, so the estate is low rather than high.
Quebec. The solidarity tax credit and the home-support credit for seniors are not modeled. Both are paid outside the income tax computation and both are income-tested, so in a year of low income you would receive more than this plan shows.
Quebec. The tax credit for career extension is not included. If you are 65 or over and still working, Quebec gives you a credit worth up to $1,786 a year that this plan does not count, so your tax before retirement is shown a little high and the estate a little low.
Saskatchewan. Saskatchewan's senior supplementary amount is not modeled. It is a credit on the SK428 itself, claimed at 65 and over, so anyone that age is shown slightly more tax than they owe and slightly less estate than they will have. The refundable low-income tax credit is not modeled either, but that one is paid outside the provincial return, with the GST credit.

Your business

Across Canada. A business you run yourself, and a corporation you own, are planned, including how much to pay yourself as salary or dividends. Two corporations in one household, and self-employment in Quebec, are not answered yet: the app tells you so rather than guessing.

United States

Health care

If you buy health coverage on the marketplace before 65, this plan prices the premium tax credit and the cliff at 400% of the poverty line. Give us the spending figure that leaves that coverage out, and the plan adds the premium back and takes the credit off. Below 138% of the poverty line it refuses rather than guesses: in most states that is where Medicaid begins, and in the states that have not expanded Medicaid the credit carries on below it, down to the poverty line, which this plan does not price.
The premium tax credit is only for people whose job does not offer them health coverage the law counts as affordable, and this plan now asks: if a job offers you coverage and your share of it for yourself alone is 9.96% or less of your income, we refuse rather than show you a credit you cannot claim. Two parts of that test we do not do. We ask what self-only coverage would cost you, which is the test for the employee. For a spouse or a child, the law tests the cost of family coverage, so if your own share is affordable and the family's is not, we turn you away where the law would let your spouse claim. And we assume your employer's plan is a decent one; a plan that pays less than 60% of costs does not bar the credit at all, and we do not ask. Both of those refuse where the law might not, so the direction is that you may be able to claim more than this shows, never less.
The benchmark premium you give us is assumed to be the plan you buy. A cheaper plan costs you less than this shows and a more expensive one more, but the credit is the same either way, because the law measures it against the benchmark rather than your choice.

Social Security

Social Security is your own record only. A benefit on a living spouse's record, and the deemed-filing rules around it, are not modeled, so a low earner married to a high earner is shown less than they would receive.
A survivor keeps the larger of the two benefits from the year after the first death, reduced if they are under full retirement age then. The qualifying-surviving-spouse status, which keeps joint rates for two more years where there is a dependent child, is not modeled, so a widow or widower with children is shown a little more tax than they would pay.

Retirement accounts

Money out of a traditional IRA or 401(k) before 59½ carries a 10% additional tax, and this plan charges it. Two ways out are modeled, so tell us if either applies: the rule of 55, if you left that employer in or after the year you turned 55, and a governmental 457(b), which the 10% never reaches. A 72(t) series is not modeled, so if you are taking one this plan overstates those years.
Money you rolled into a 457(b) from a 401(k), a 403(b) or an IRA keeps the 10% it came with, and this plan treats the whole balance as free of it. If much of yours was rolled in and you are under 59½, your tax is higher than this shows. It is the one place the error runs that way.
With both a 457(b) and a 401(k) or 403(b) at work, this plan pays the full limit into each, because the law does: the 457(b) limit is its own. The special 457(b) catch-up in the three years before your plan's normal retirement age is not modeled, so close to retirement you may be able to save more than this shows.
Before 59 and a half, money moved into a Roth cannot come out within five years without that same 10%, and this plan keeps it in until then; from 59 and a half the five years no longer cost anything, and this plan may draw it. It counts what you moved in today's dollars, though, where the law counts the dollars themselves, so before 59 and a half it can let slightly more out early than the law treats as yours, and that part would owe the 10%. It treats the Roth you already have as yours to take today. Before 59 and a half that is true only of what you paid in and of conversions over five years old, so if you are younger than that, give us only those. From 59 and a half all of it is yours once your first Roth is five years old.
If you are still working, this plan works out how much would go into your 401(k) and your IRA each year, and which side of each. About the job it assumes the simple thing: your pay, and any business profit, rise with inflation and no faster, you keep the same employer, and you stop on the date you gave us. A bonus, a career change or a year out is not in it.

Other savings, and your children

Your taxable brokerage account is assumed to pay out 1% of its value a year, 30% of that as interest and the rest as qualified dividends, which is roughly a balanced fund. Hold only stocks and you pay a little less than this shows; hold more bonds and a little more. When you sell, the gain is what you sell for less your share of what you paid, and what you paid is a fixed dollar figure that inflation does not raise, so the plan taxes the growth your account earns from here on as well as the growth it already has. A sale for less than you paid is counted as no gain rather than a loss you could use against other income, which can only show more tax than you would pay.
Tell us your children's ages and this plan works out the Child Tax Credit: $2,200 a child, fading above $200,000 of income for a single filer and $400,000 for a couple. It does not pay the refundable half, so a household whose tax the credit already zeroes gets a little more back than this shows. Both thresholds are frozen in the law, so in real terms they fall every year, and the plan shows that.

When you die

When the last of you dies, this plan takes the estate tax off what is left. The federal one starts at $15,000,000 for one person and $30,000,000 for a couple, so few people pay it. Most states charge nothing on top. Where yours does and we model it, what is shown as your estate is after both; where yours charges one we do not yet model, the note for your state says so and the figure here is higher than what your family would keep. Either way it is after the income tax whoever inherits your 401(k) or IRA will owe on it.
The estate is worked out on your balances and on any home or rental property you tell us about. It does not include anything else you own: a business, life insurance paid to your estate, or gifts you have already made and have to add back. If those carry your estate over a threshold, the tax will be more than this shows.

One more applies only to some households: if your income in the years before Medicare is low enough for Medicaid, the app does not answer, because it does not calculate Medicaid and a plan that ignored it would be wrong.

All 13 Canadian provinces and territories and all 51 American jurisdictions, each tested extensively. Where it works says what each one works out and what it leaves out.