How to set up your retirement planner

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Want to make sure you have enough left over once it's time to put the tools down and kick your feet up? In this guide, we'll walk you through every step of how to set up your retirement planner.

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1. A quick summary

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Your retirement planner takes all of your account balances, preferred retirement age, and return rates into account to then provide you with a balance you'll be left over with at your retirement age. The retirement planner is used as a guide only; we use some standard assumptions provided by the FMA here in New Zealand for inflation amounts and predicted salary increase amounts. You can find these assumptions here. Once you've entered in all your details and added your connected accounts, you can review what you'll be left with at retirement and then assess if you need to make adjustments. 

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2. Enter in your age details

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Start by entering your date of birth, preferred retirement age, and how long you'd like your retirement fund to last. Once you're done, simply select 'Save details'.

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3. Add your accounts

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Once you've added your age details, you'll need to add an account towards your retirement. Your accounts are typically your savings, investment, and Kiwisaver accounts that grow in value over time, but if you'd like to allocate a normal everyday account, you can do that too.

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To add an account, tap the + symbol, which will then bring you to the add an account screen. Select which accounts you'd like to allocate towards your retirement fund, and then select the 'Add accounts' green button.

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4. Enter and update your contributions

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Now that you've added your connected accounts, you can then add your contributions for each account. There's different information to enter when adding contributions to your Kiwisaver account compared to your savings. To edit the contribution details, simply tap on the drop-down to the right of each account. 

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Savings & investment account contributions

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To add your contributions to your savings and investment accounts, simply tap on the drop-down arrow to open the details. First simply enter in your tax rate, then enter in how much you contribute, how often, and what your expected annual interest rate or investment return is. Once you're done, simply select 'Save details and then tap the green-up arrow to collapse the dropdown. 

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Kiwisaver account contributions

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To add your contributions to a Kiwisaver account, simply tap on the drop-down arrow to open the details. Now enter in your pre-tax annual income; we require this in order to calculate your contribution rate. Once you've entered your income, enter the annual growth rate for your fund. You can then select your contribution rates for yourself and from your employer as well. If you make any voluntary contributions, you can also enter these here too.

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Once you've finished entering your details, select 'Save details' and tap the green up arrow to collapse the dropdown.

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5. Your retirement balances

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Once you've entered in all your contributions, we then do some work behind the scenes and calculate what you'll have left at retirement in each account. You can choose to adjust these figures to account for inflation or not by simply tapping the green button. You'll then see a pop-up allowing you to select if you'd like to adjust for inflation or not. 

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6. Your pension payments

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Once you've viewed your retirement balances, you can then select your details for your pension payments to see if you qualify. Simply tap on the buttons to the right of each heading to select which options match your situation, such as your income tax code and your NZ Super option.

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To find out more about your pension payments here.

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7. Retirement fund

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Now, once you've entered all of your details, you can view what your retirement income will be based on all of your forecasted retirement account balances. You can toggle between options to view it as weekly, fortnightly, monthly, or annual amounts. 

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Under your retirement income, we'll compare the current total of your expense budget to your retirement income and let you know if you'll have money left over or if you'll be short and need to make some adjustments.

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You're all ready to go 🎉

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Woohoo! You're all set up and ready to pave the path for your retirement. If you run into any issues while getting everything set up, feel free to get in touch with us at hello@budgetbuddie.co.nz