How much can you safely spend in retirement?

Test your retirement before you live it.

Tell us what you’ve saved and what you’d like to spend. Income Horizon checks your plan against every stock market since 1928, crashes included.

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The far ridge is the real growth of U.S. stocks, 1928–2025.

How Income Horizon works

Three ideas, explained simply. Try them with your own numbers below.

Guardrails

Your spending adjusts a little with the market: a small cut after a big drop, a raise after a big gain.

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  • Markets slip, cut a little. If a downturn pushes your withdrawal rate well above where it started (say 20% higher), trim spending about 10%.
  • Otherwise, hold steady. Most years nothing changes, and spending keeps pace with inflation.
  • Markets soar, give yourself a raise. If growth pulls your rate well below where it started, raise spending about 10%.

Agreeing to small, temporary cuts in bad years is what lets you start out spending more than a fixed rule would allow.

Try your guardrails

The two-bucket system

Keep a few years of spending in cash, so a crash doesn’t force you to sell investments at low prices.

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  • Safety bucket. A few years of spending in cash and Treasury bonds. Your yearly spending comes from here.
  • Growth bucket. Everything else, invested in stocks and bonds for the long run.
  • Refill once growth recovers. When your investments are back near their previous high, top the safety bucket back up. Until then, leave growth alone.

You can usually avoid selling stocks in a crash while your paycheck stays the same. The trade-off: the cash earns less, which can drag on long-run growth, and a very long slump can still outlast the bucket.

See it in a real crash

Our plan: both together

Guardrails set how much you spend. The cash bucket decides where the money comes from.

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  • Spending flexes with markets. Cut a little when your withdrawal rate runs high, take a raise when markets soar, and never go below a floor you pick.
  • Paychecks come from cash. A safety bucket holds about four years of spending. In a down market, if it runs low, you trim spending a little for a year instead of selling investments at low prices.
  • Refill once growth recovers. Top the cash back up only when your investments are back near their previous high.

Your floor is the dial: the further you’re willing to cut for a few lean years, the lower your odds of running out.

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Your savings

Change assumptions

7.5% growth and 2.5% inflation are typical long-run figures for a mix of stocks and bonds.

At age 58 you could have about

—

in today’s dollars, or — in future dollars.

Your spending guardrails

Guardrails tell you when to adjust your spending. Make them tighter or looser and watch your plan react.

Three ways to take money out

Same savings, same spending, same history. Here’s how often the money lasted to age 95 in past retirements.

Learn moreGet our plan written out for your advisor, or checked every year. Compare Free, Plus and the printable plan.

What most retirement plans get wrong

When the stock market falls, most retirees have to sell investments at low prices to pay the bills. Our plan pays you from a cash cushion instead. Here’s someone who retired in 2000, right before two crashes, with your savings and spending.

  • Sold investments right after a drop
  • Paid from cash instead
  • Normal year

Stress-test your retirement plan

Free. No credit card.

Enter your email to unlock, built from your numbers:

  • Every retirement since 1928, replayed year by year
  • Interactive spending guardrails
  • Two-bucket simulator
  • Odds of running short across 3,000 simulated markets
  • Side-by-side strategy comparison
See a sample of the printable plan

Where our numbers come from

Every result on this site comes from replaying real market history, not from an assumed average return. Here’s exactly what we use, and what your plan is invested in. Full methodology · every year of the data.

The market history

Actual yearly returns from 1928 to 2025, adjusted for inflation:

  • Stocks: the S&P 500, with dividends reinvested
  • Bonds: 10-year U.S. Treasury bonds
  • Cash: 3-month U.S. Treasury bills
  • Inflation: the Consumer Price Index (CPI)

Sources: annual return series published by Aswath Damodaran at NYU Stern, and CPI from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The 2025 figures are preliminary.

Your investment mix

Your plan isn’t 100% stocks. On average across its history tests, it holds:

    How each test works

    • Past retirements: your plan is run through every stretch of history as long as your retirement, one starting each year from 1928.
    • Monte Carlo: 3,000 made-up retirements, each stitched together from random 5-year stretches of real history.
    • Today’s dollars: all amounts are adjusted for inflation, so $150k means $150k of today’s buying power.
    • Not included: taxes, investment fees, and returns outside the U.S.

    Free retirement calculators

    Quick answers to common retirement questions, each tested against every market since 1928. No sign-up needed.

    4% rule calculatorHow often the classic rule lasted 30 years since 1928. Can I retire with $2 million?What $2 million supported at different spending levels. How long will my savings last?Years your money lasted, for every start year. Cash bucket size calculatorHow much cash to hold, and how each size held up. Sequence-of-returns riskWhy a bad first decade matters so much. What happened to 2008 retirees?Three plans through the financial crisis.
    See all retirement tools

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    • Your rules, written out step by step
    • Your results in famous market crashes
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