Coast FIRE Calculator
See when your savings can coast to retirement on their own.
Calculator workspace
You're $0 short of Coast FIRE.
You need about $0 invested today to reach $0 by 60, and you have $275k. Your yearly savings do not close the gap in time.
- Coast Number Today
- $0
- Full FIRE Number
- $0
- Coast FIRE Age
- Not Reached
Your Path to Coasting
How It Works
Coast FIRE, as used here, means your investments are already large enough that compounding alone is estimated to reach your full FIRE number by the retirement age you enter. From that point you only need to earn enough to cover today’s living costs.
The calculator adds the amount you save each year to find the first age you reach that point. All amounts are in today’s dollars.
Your FIRE number is annual retirement spending divided by the withdrawal rate. If you enter CPP and OAS income from 65, it is reduced accordingly. The amount needed to coast at any age is the FIRE number divided by (1 + real return) for each year left before retirement.
You have reached Coast FIRE the first year your investments pass that amount. After that, the estimate assumes you stop adding to them and lets them compound.
What It Leaves Out
- Tax, account types, and fees are not modeled.
- CPP and OAS are a flat amount from 65 that you enter, not an estimate of your own benefits.
- A constant real return ignores sequence-of-returns risk.
- Spending and savings change over a career; this is a single-path sketch.
Your spending, savings, retirement age, real return and withdrawal-rate assumptions.
FAQ
In traditional FIRE, your portfolio must cover all living expenses from the day you stop working. In Coast FIRE, your investments are large enough to grow to that amount by your retirement age, so you only need to cover day-to-day costs until then. Barista FIRE is the in-between case where part-time work covers some expenses.
You can stop adding to your retirement savings, as long as you leave them invested and your assumptions hold. You still need income to cover your living costs until your retirement age.
A real return of 4.0% to 5.5% after inflation is a common historical benchmark for diversified equity portfolios. Assuming higher returns lowers the required amount today but increases sensitivity to market downturns.