Retirement planning is an essential process for anyone who wants to save up the best way possible. If you intend on living your retirement in style, then you need to invest in retirement planning software. Software packages for individuals can help you manage your personal finances and create a plan for a prosperous retirement. Plan an Ideal Retirement Future With the Latest Retirement Planning Software One of the main factors that will influence your future is your retirement planning. Even if you have been successful in saving up some money, you will definitely need proper software to plan appropriately for your retirement. There are many tools in the market to make retirement planning easier. There are different types of retirement planning software available in the market. The top 10 best retirement planning software 2020 are:-
PERSONAL CAPITAL
Personal Capital is a comprehensive and powerful one-stop shop for everything related to financial planning. The app offers one of the strongest integration systems available for mobile platforms; you’re able to connect with over 10,000 institutions ranging from major banks like Fidelity and TD Bank to accessory sites like PayPal and Amazon.
This makes it easy for you to see all of your finances and investments in a single, convenient package. Personal Capital offers an impressive range of retirement planning tools including deposit and growth projections, spending analysis and advisory tools. Personal Capital even functions as a budgeting app; you can link your credit and debit cards after signing up for an account.
Personal Capital’s system will analyze your spending and suggest places to cut back so you can put more money toward your goals. Though Personal Capital is typically classified as a robo-advisor, one of the big draws of the app is access to human financial advisors.
Charles Schwab Retirement Calculator
Charles Schwab offers a free retirement savings calculator that will tell you if you are saving enough to cover your estimated annual retirement expenses. The calculator collects information from you, including your current age, planned retirement age and investment style. You also enter your current income, amount saved for retirement and monthly savings. The calculator asks when you plan to start receiving Social Security benefits and how much you plan to spend each year in retirement. The tool then offers a summary of your current projected retirement savings, along with the savings needed. It offers suggestions on what to change, such as your retirement age or annual contributions, to meet your savings needs by the time you retire.
Betterment
Betterment is a low-cost robo-advisor investment platform. But it makes our list of best retirement tracking apps because of the free Retirement Savings Calculator it offers. The calculator will ask you four questions:
- How old are you? This is used to calculate how long you’ll have to contribute before you reach retirement.
- What is your household annual pre-tax income? This is used to estimate your Social Security benefits.
- How much has your household already saved for retirement? You’ll want to include the balance of any 401(k)s, IRAs, or other accounts that are earmarked for your retirement.
- How much is your household saving for retirement each year? This is used to calculate the income that your investments may provide in retirement.
Once you’ve finished this quick questionnaire, Betterment can instantly generate a graph that projects your annual spending in retirement. On the left, you’ll see the amount of income that your investments are likely to generate in retirement. And, on the right, you’ll see how much income your investments would mostly generate in retirement even if they performed poorly.
For more accurate estimates, you can also open a free Betterment account, after which you’ll be able to sync your external accounts. Once your accounts have been linked, you can log back in at any time to track your progress. Betterment’s “No Fee” tier also offers a no-fee checking account and a high-yield savings account.
Betterment’s expert tax advice is one of its biggest strengths. In addition to tax-loss harvesting strategies, it can help you find tax-efficient rebalancing and asset location options. In fact, Betterment’s simulations show that following its recommendations over a 30-year span could lead to an estimated 38.8% more of after-tax money in retirement.
Of course, you can always choose to upgrade to one of Betterment’s investing tiers if you’d like more retirement advice. The annual fee is 0.25% for Betterment’s “Digital Investing” tier and 0.40% for its “Premium” tier (which includes unlimited CFP access).
WEALTHSIMPLE
Wealthsimple is a relatively new retirement planning app that focuses on low fees, reasonable account minimums and a focus on technical simplicity. True to its name, the company’s app offers a clean design, which allows you to visualize your retirement progress with graphs and charts.
There is no account minimum needed to open a Wealthsimple Basic portfolio, and even Basic users are allowed one free phone call with a financial planner to help ensure that you’re on the right track. In addition to Wealthsimple’s simple retirement planning app, the company also offers a unique and diverse range of investment options aimed at nontraditional investors and younger investors who would like a more unique profile option.
Investors who want to create a more socially responsible retirement account can choose to invest in one of three weighted socially responsible indexes. Each of these indexes draws from six ETFs that invest in technology firms that research cleaner energy, corporations that employ diverse hiring practices and companies dedicated to fair-trade practices with developing nations. If you are a follower of the Islamic faith, Wealthsimple also offers “halal investing” options.
STASH’S RETIREMENT CALCULATOR
If you’re looking for a quick picture of how much you need to save for retirement, Stash’s Retirement Calculator is a great choice. Enter your age, your intended retirement age, your pre-tax income, and how much you’ve saved and are saving, and you’ll get a snapshot of how much you’ll need and how much you’re on track to have.
But Stash’s Retirement Calculator is also useful for those who want a more thorough view, as well. That’s because you can choose to incorporate several assumptions into the mix. These include how much of your current income you expect to need in retirement, your investment rate of return, life expectancy, and inflation. By making informed estimates here, you’ll get a much better idea of where you stand when it comes to retirement savings.
A tiny minimum investment to start — only $5 — Stash is an excellent choice for beginner investors. If you go for the free Retirement Calculator, you might end up staying for the whole service.
MINT
Though Mint bills itself primarily as a personal financial management and budgeting app, the app also allows you to track your investments and save for retirement. Mint’s intuitive and easy-to-use platform allows you to create and work towards multiple goals at the same time, so it’s useful if you’re trying to work your way out of credit card debt or save for a home alongside your ultimate goal of funding retirement.
With Mint, you can import data from your investment profile and checking and savings accounts. Mint will then analyze your spending habits, categorize them and make suggestions on how you can change your behavior to save more towards your goals. Mint also offers alerts for things like bill due dates, rate changes and large purchases.
You can also monitor your credit score through Mint’s app, which can help you see how your savings progress is going. Mint’s budgeting and planning tools are vast but its investing options are limited. The app works best when used in conjunction with a Mint alternative that focuses less on budgeting and more on investing options. Still, the app is easy to use and can make tracking your retirement progress simple.
THE COMPLETE RETIREMENT PLANNER
At $79.99, this planner allows you to create a customized and detailed financial plan for both before and after retirement. If you’re married, it allows annual amounts to be entered for each spouse in different categories, including multiple income sources, traditional 401(k) and IRA contributions, investment return rates and Social Security income.
TCRP is a digital download and remains with you, allowing you to enter personal information without having sensitive financial data stored in an outside source. There are integrated notes on complex topics like Medicare costs, Social Security benefits and common tax laws. The planner comes with a built-in Social Security calculator and helps estimate health care costs in retirement.
WEALTHFRONT
Wealthfront is another company that is primarily known for its robo-advisor platform. At the end of 2018, however, it made big waves by announcing that it was launching FREE financial planning services inside its mobile app.
Wealthfront’s free app allows users to map out their financial future and achieve their goals by running scenarios and receiving world-class, data-driven advice. In fact, Wealthfront says that its app includes answers to 10,000 investment questions!
One major reason that Wealthfront is one of the best retirement tracking apps available today is that doesn’t require any manual input. Simply link your bank, brokerage, and loan accounts, and Wealthfront can automatically calculate your retirement savings and projected net worth.
Wealthfront’s financial planning tools revolve around your financial goals. Whether you want to buy a house or pay for your child’s college education, Wealthfront will show you how much (and in which type of account) you should be saving each month to reach your goals on time. You can also easily see how your retirement savings would be impacted if your goals were modified or delayed.
CONCLUSION
Before selecting the best retirement software, you must evaluate how well it fits into your budget. Examine the program to determine if it will truly work for you, or if you need to upgrade to a more complex system. Also look at if your current income will allow you to afford the necessary maintenance fees for the system you select. Consider these tips as you make your decision.