Can you retire in the next 5 years without cutting your lifestyle?
Pathwyze helps affluent pre-retirees model spending, Social Security, taxes, and bad-market risk before they leave work.
Best for households with roughly $750k+ saved. If retirement timing is no longer theoretical, this page is designed to help you pressure-test the decision before you make it.
Free plan available. No credit card required.
Example readiness check
One near-retirement household
Target retirement date
January 2030
Planned spending
$106k / year
Guaranteed income
Social Security at 67
Biggest risk
Bad first 5 years
Best lever in this example
Work 1 more year or trim spending 8%
Small changes in retirement date and spending often matter more than people expect.
What this page helps avoid
- Retiring based on one optimistic projection
- Ignoring Social Security timing and taxes
- Getting blindsided by a bad first few retirement years
This page is for you if the retirement decision is already on your calendar
It is designed for near-retirement households with enough saved to make mistakes expensive, but not enough certainty to be casual about the decision.
Retirement is close enough to feel real
You are roughly 1 to 5 years from retirement and want to know whether stopping work soon is actually viable.
You have real savings to protect
Best for households with roughly $750k+ saved who need a clearer answer than a generic retirement calculator can give.
You are making a live decision now
You are weighing retirement date, spending, Social Security timing, or how much downside risk your plan can handle.
Questions this helps you answer
The goal is not to admire a chart. It is to decide whether your current plan still works under less friendly conditions.
Can I retire in the next 3 to 5 years?
Compare retire-at-62 vs 64 vs 66 and see how contributions, spending, and timing shift the odds.
How much can I safely spend?
Turn your portfolio and future income into a realistic annual spending target instead of relying on one rule of thumb.
What if markets fall right after I retire?
Pressure-test a bad first five years, elevated inflation, and sequence risk before the market does it for you.
How do Social Security and taxes change the answer?
See how claiming timing, taxable income, and withdrawal order affect the burden your portfolio must carry.
What you'll model
A retirement readiness check should be about your real tradeoffs
You do not need a perfect data room to get started. You need enough signal to see whether retirement timing, spending, Social Security, and downside risk still fit together.
- Portfolio balances and account mix
- Annual retirement spending
- Retirement date scenarios
- Social Security start age
- Inflation and return assumptions
- Bad-market early retirement paths
Example result snapshot
What a useful answer should look like
Retire at 63
Fragile
Works only if markets cooperate and spending stays tight.
Retire at 64
More durable
Adds contribution time and shortens the years your portfolio must fund.
Spend 8% less
Meaningful improvement
Small spending cuts can materially improve a near-retirement plan.
Delay Social Security
Depends on household fit
May improve guaranteed income later, but changes the bridge years first.
Good retirement planning is not about one perfect number.
It is about seeing which assumptions matter most and what you would do if the plan weakens.
Who this page is not for
This page works best when the retirement decision is close, concrete, and expensive to get wrong.
Frequently asked questions
The main job of this page is to help you decide whether your next step should be a readiness check, not another generic calculator.
Is this financial advice?
No. Pathwyze is a planning and modeling tool. It helps you evaluate retirement timing, spending, taxes, and risk more clearly, but it does not replace personalized financial, tax, or legal advice.
How is this different from a retirement calculator?
Most calculators show one projection. Pathwyze helps you compare retirement dates, spending levels, Social Security timing, and bad-market scenarios so you can see what breaks the plan and what improves it.
Do I need every exact number before I start?
No. A reasonable first pass is enough. The goal is to get to a useful baseline quickly, then refine the assumptions that matter most.
Can I compare multiple retirement dates?
Yes. That is one of the main use cases. The page is built for households asking whether they can retire sooner, should work a little longer, or need to adjust spending first.
Run your free retirement readiness check
See whether your current savings, spending, and retirement date still hold up if markets disappoint early or inflation stays elevated.