Full Life Cycle Retirement Planning Calculator on Googlesheets

[GarryInPlano]

Full Life Cycle Retirement Planning Calculator on Googlesheets
(Anyone with the link can edit the spreadsheet…be careful not to change the equations.)
By Garry Beckham (Age 73)
BS Economics/Mathematics
BS Computer Science
MS Business
_________________________
and by Harold Peters (father-in-law) (Age 90)
BS Civil Engineering
MS Aeronautical Engineering and Space Technology
_________________________

My father-in-law and I have been working on financial equations and methods for a long time. Harold some 40 years.
Any Boglehead that would like to use our “Full Life Cycle Retirement Planning Calculator” is welcome to use it.
This spreadsheet incorporates using inflation adjusted payments while working and inflation adjusted withdrawals during retirement. Also, the calculator has fee inputs and also provides a comparison of different fees values.
The Five Tabs on the Spreadsheet are:
1. Calculator INPUT/OUT
2. More Analysis
3. Annual Investment Schedule
4. Annual Investment Schedule
5. Total Value Graph --- when you scroll over the bars each year value is shown
This is a mathematical model calculator that can be used for teaching young people about retirement planning. Values can be changed to make comparisons, with the results being presented immediately. Examples:
1. Use an input current age of 25, get the nest egg value, then change only the current age to 35. Note the nest egg difference.
2. Use a fee of 0.3%. Note the nest egg. Then change the fee to 1.0% and note the nest egg. Lots of difference.
Also, those currently working and investing for retirement, and can use their past numbers and predict the future, hopefully a viable retirement nest egg.
About 15 years ago, Harold had a couple of personal letters with John Bogle, CEO and Founder of Vanguard. Harold had seen a writing by Bogle about the impact of fees over a 20-year term. Harold made a package, full of pencil drawings, equations and values that illustrated that the term of 20 years wasn’t a long enough time, and that something in the range of 40-60 years should be used due to the long years of accumulation (working years) and withdrawal (retirement years). As the Bogleheads know, if total fees are above about half a percent, the impact on the Nest Egg is devastating.
Anyone that has this link can use and can edit the spreadsheet calculator:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... sp=sharing

High School Student Get New Tool for Retirement Planning from Texas Instruments!
Recently Harold wrote to the CEO of Texas Instrument, Haviv Ilan, with similar information as he had sent to John Bogle many years ago. Again, it was written in pencil, with hand drawn diagrams, and he only used a calculator. He doesn’t have a computer! Harold stated in his letter “that there is nowhere better to learn about retirement investment and programs than in high school. He emphasized that high school is the only place that all the young people would have the opportunity to understand the importance of starting retirement savings early and other essentials for a robust retirement account.
Mr. Haviv Ilan agreed with Harold and tasked his Education and Calculator Division to write a program for high school students, and anyone with a T-84/Ti-NSpire calculator to use. This software was written using Harold’s equations and methodology.
This month, November 2023, the software has been completed and available at Texas Instruments.
My guess is over the next six months, the Ti Retirement Calculator will begin use in High Schools all over the United States. If you have seniors in high school, ask them next semester if they are using the Texas Instrument Retirement Calculator.
To review Texas Instrument’s blog on this new program, links to the software, go to:
https://education.ti.com/en/bulletinboa ... ng-program

High school students learning about retirement planning is a big deal. It should have happened many years ago. Many States have recently passed mandates that their highs schools must teach financial education to all the students. Retirement planning will be included.

Garry Beckham
Plano, Texas

[LadyGeek]

Welcome! Financial literacy is an important topic we discuss in this forum.

I should clarify that your spreadsheet is protected and gives an error when trying to make changes. To use the spreadsheet, login to your Google account and make a copy. You can edit the spreadsheet from there.

Update: The cells are still protected.

[JohnFiscal]

Great! Sounds cool. I have seen some commercial software that has this intention, of lifetime optimization rather than optimizing for retirement. Kotlikoff's MaxiFi Planner, for one. I wish I had had the interest and smarts to think about this when I was younger. By the time I was interested I was planning for retirement and my then-current situations.

One software I am sad to see fall way in James Welch's iORP (Optimizing Retirement Planner). That only addressed retirement planning, not the full life cycle. But it was incredibly all-inclusive. I went through that independently, found it very accurate; pointed some issues to James ...often he would point out my own misunderstanding but I did catch a few things. But the experience gave me great confidence in the program. I don't know how it stands now.

I guess the only other one that captured my excitement as much as iORP was the commercial software Financial Engines, made available by Vanguard a long long time ago.

Good luck with your program!

[GarryInPlano]

Tab 4 should read "4. Annual Withdrawal Schedule"

[GarryInPlano]

New link to the Financial Planner.
One of our Bogleheads edited the code in the spreadsheet, and made it unusuable. I am providing a new link.
Once you have gotten to the "Full Life Cycle Planner", please make a copy of it in googlesheets. Then edit all you want.
Please don't edit the one at the link.
Enjoy!
Garry
Link is:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/ ... sp=sharing