Showing posts with label Online Calculator. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Online Calculator. Show all posts

Friday, August 25, 2017

CPF Life’s Return (/Annuity) Calculator Online

Previously, I have made available a “CPF Life Payout-Return Online Calculator“ here:

where you can calculate the payout you are supposed to receive based on the expected annuity return you desire (which should be 4% according to CPF) if you can live to certain age!

However, for people who are only interested in calculating the expected annuity return only (based on the age they expect to be able to live until and the actual CPF Life payout they receive and the bequest you are entitled when the person die), that calculator is really a hassle and a pain in the neck!

For those who are only interested in calculating the expected annuity return only (based on the age you expect to be able to live until and the actual CPF Life payout they receive and the bequest), good news! I have now created another CPF Life’s Return Online Calculator which is specifically meant for that purpose!
Not only that, this calculator also allows you to enter the “Bequest” amount (in the “Future Value” box). This CPF Life’s Return Online Calculator is basically similar to an annuity online calculator!

You can access my CPF Life’s Return online calculator at this web link:

Ok, using my online calculator, you need to key in the following (for example):

Online Calculator for CPF Life's Return / Annuity
Name                                                             Value
Present Value ($)                                           -258811
Future Value ($)                                            91141
Number of Periods (months)                        120
Payment Amount ($)                                     1196
Interest Rate per period, %                           0.01
Interest Rate per Year, %                             
Payment At:        Beginning                          =End   

Instructions:
(a) To calculate interest rate for default input values: Press "ir" button to calculate interest rate for default values!
(b) To compute for other unknown value: Type in four known values, then press one of the buttons at the right to compute the unknown value. (E.g., to solve an example problem to compute "Future Value", press the "fv" button above)
(c) Always remember that money you paid out (put) into annuity should have negative value, while money you received should have positive value!
(d) Note: If you are not getting any computed result for computing "ir", try varying the value keyed into "Interest Rate per period, %"!
(e) Also enter the interest rate per period (not per year).

Example, to compute/solve for CPF Life annuity’s return (i.e. we are interested in the “Interest Rate per Year, %” figure), press the "ir" button above! This will result in the estimated CPF Life annuity’s return per period (in this case 1 period = 1 month) being shown in the box to the right of the text “Interest Rate per period, %” (and replacing the initial value of “0.01”)!  However, we usually deal with per year return and hence what we are really interest is the figure to the right of the text “Interest Rate per Year, %”!

Note that in the above, I assume:
(a)    The present value “-258811” is the amount you will have at 65 years old if you retain $166,000 at 55 years old in CPF Retirement Account.
(b)    The age by which this person will live till passing away to be 75 years old (for example), so the “Number of Periods” (which you would be able receive CPF Life payout) = (75-65)x12 = 120.
(c)    The “Payment Amount” is the actual CPF Life payout amount you receive, which is currently about $1196 pm for CPF Life Standard plan for women.
(d)    “Interest Rate per period, %” is what we want to calculate, and we can do so by clicking on the “ir” button (by clicking on “ir” using left-mouse-button).  If you are not getting any computed result or incorrect result for computing the interest rate after clicking “ir”, try entering a different value into the "Interest Rate per period, %" (e.g. 0.01, -0.01, etc)!
(e)    The “Bequest” figure is $91141 (based on CPF Board’s CPF Life payout estimator http://www.cpf.gov.sg/eSvc/Web/Schemes/LifePayoutEstimator/LifePayoutEstimator). If you want to estimate the CPF Life annuity return for the case where a person passes away earlier than the average life-span (and hence the “Bequest” is more than $0), you can enter the “Bequest” figure in the box to the right of the text “Future Value”!

Remember to use negative values for money you paid into the annuity, and positive values for money you received (for both monthly payout and bequest). Also enter the interest rate per period, not per year (don’t enter anything into the “Interest Rate per Year, %” box!). If you are receiving monthly payments and have an annual interest rate, divide the annual rate by 12. Thus, interest rate for one period of an 8% annual rate is 8%/12 and is entered as 0.666666.

My "CPF Life’s Return Calculator Online" can be regarded as a complementary tool to CPF Life’s "CPF LIFE Payout Estimator".
You can access "CPF LIFE Payout Estimator" from the link in this URL...
               http://make-money-secrets.blogspot.com/p/useful-links.html

When you join CPF LIFE, you can choose between:
•  the LIFE Standard Plan; or
•  the LIFE Basic Plan; or
•  the LIFE Escalating Plan.
Each CPF LIFE plan provides a different combination of trade-offs between the amount of monthly payouts that you would receive and the bequest that you would leave for your beneficiaries. 

No details have been released as to how CPF Board derives the monthly payout and bequest figures, and also the interest you will earn for your money (that remains not disbursed yet), the insurance charges and also administrative fees levied on you, and hence your best bet will be just to calculate the over-all return of your CPF Retirement Account balance at 65 years old!
              

My "CPF Life’s Return Calculator Online" can give you an idea how much return has been assumed into the CPF Life payout based on the original CPF Life principle number (your Retirement Account balance at 65 years old) and the payout you are getting (to see whether you are getting better return from CPF Life than Insurance Annuity scheme) and the bequest amount (even touch wood you die before 82.5 years old when your RA fund has been totally drawn down).  You can also get a glimpse of which scheme is a better deal for you...  

Saturday, October 22, 2016

Retirement Savings + CPF Life (+ Inflation + Bequest) Calculator Online


In my previous post, I had made demonstrated how to use my online calculator, which you can find it here:
    http://make-money-secrets.blogspot.sg/p/retirement-savings-online-calculator.html
to calculate how much you need to have saved by the time you retire.

I had illustrated for this example using my online calculator, where you need to key in the following:

Amount you would like to withdraw each month in retirement ($):  6000
Annual Interest Rate you expect to earn on savings (in dec., eg 0.03 for 3%):  0.01
Number of years you would like to make monthly withdrawals:  35 

Then, you can click on “Calculate” and the online calculator will give you the output as:
This is how much you need to have saved by the time you retire ($):   $2,125,506.18

I had concluded that: “So in conclusion, if a couple is able to accumulate $2.12 Millions dollars, they would be able to retire at 50 years old with pretty comfortable life-style!
Note that I have not taken CPF Life payout (starting at 65 years old) into account, so in practise a couple need less than $2.12M to retire comfortably if you take into consideration that they will be receiving $1300 pm for man and $1200 pm for women starting from the age of 65 years old!

Ok, so the issue here is now regarding CPF Life payout.
I have friends enquiring about whether I can also factor CPF Life payout into account in my retirement savings calculator, since CPF Life (which is a form of life-time annuity scheme) is now part and parcel of every retirees in Singapore!

I am glad to say that I had managed to include not only CPF Life payout but also effect of inflation and also considering bequest (i.e. the amount you want to leave to your heirs) into my Retirement Savings online calculator!  You can access my Retirement Savings + CPF Life (+ Inflation + Bequest) Online Calculator here:
    https://make-money-secrets.blogspot.sg/p/retirement-savingscpf-life-calculator.html

Let’s just try my Retirement Savings + CPF Life (+ Inflation + Bequest) Online Calculator by keying in the following parameters:


Amount you would like to withdraw each month in retirement ($): 6,000.00
Annual Interest Rate you expect to earn on your savings (eg key in "3" for 3%): 1.0
Age you would like to retire (Years Old): 50
Amount you want to leave to your heirs (bequest) ($): 0.00
Annual living Inflation Rate you expect (eg key in "2" for 2%): 1.0
CPF Life Payout Amount per mth ($): 2,500.00
CPF Life Payout starting Age (Years Old): 65
Age you expect to live until (Years Old): 85

Then, you can click on “Calculate” and the online calculator will give you the output as:

This is how much you need to have saved by the time you retire (before inflation) ($): Calc.  
$1,525,506.18
This is how much you need to have saved by the time you retire (inflation-adjusted) ($): Calc.  
$2,064,000.00

So, we can see that in order for a couple to retire at 50 years old and to have $6000 per month for retirement (for both’s expenses), you need to save $1.525M (before inflation) and if you factor in inflation (assuming just 1%), you would need to save $1.920M!

Note that I had made following assumptions:
Assume that both the couple retiring at 50 years old will live only till 85 years old.
Assume that CPF Life payout for the couple is $2500 per month (being $1300 pm for men and $1200 pm for women if both have the Full Retirement Sum of $161,000 at 55 years old) and that these figures (hopefully) will not be lowered in future.
Assume that inflation is only 1% (which is on the low side, a more realistic figure should be 2% as used in CPF Escalating Payout plan).
Assume that the interest/return you would get for your pot of savings to have an average of 1% (which is also on the low side, and I think a more realistic figure can be 2% and above if you have >$1M to invest).

You can play around and change the parameters to those values that suit your situation and you can then plan your own retirement!

With my Retirement Savings + CPF Life (+ Inflation + Bequest) Online Calculator, now you can plan your own finances independently without needing the help of financial planners! (Beware of financial planners! – because some are all out to sell their products rather than to help you plan your finances and advise you appropriately for your retirement!)

Again, you can access all the online calculators that I have developed from this web link URL:
    https://make-money-secrets.blogspot.sg/p/my-online-calculators.html



Sunday, October 9, 2016

Retirement Savings Calculator Online - How much do you need to save before you can retire?

Ever thought of retiring early? (Yes, early, like at 50 years old, and not at 65 years old!)

Ever wonder how much you need to have before you can retire?

Have you started planning and figuring out what is the total amount of savings you will need before you can retire?

As a general guide, in order to calculate how much total amount of savings you will need before you can retire, you need to have an idea of how much you need to spend per month during retirement. Also, you would need to estimate how many years you will spend in retirement before you pass away and how much your accumulated capital can still grow while they are being draw-down.

In my previous post, as can be seen here,

I estimated that a very basic no frail cost of living in Singapore for a couple would be about $1,348.00 per month, or $674 per person per month (I assume rental costs to be $0 because I assume the couple has a fully paid property).  

I have made available a “Retirement Savings Online Calculator“ here:

where you can calculate how much total amount of savings you will need before you can afford to retire.

 Let’s start again with the couple who can survive with very basic no frail cost of living in Singapore for just $1,348.00 per month, so how much would the couple need if they wish to retire at 50 years old?
Ok, using my online calculator, you need to key in the following:

Amount you would like to withdraw each month in retirement ($):  1348
Annual Interest Rate you expect to earn on savings (in dec., eg 0.03 for 3%):  0.01
Number of years you would like to make monthly withdrawals:    35 
 
Then, you can click on “Calculate” and the online calculator will give you the output as:
This is how much you need to have saved by the time you retire ($):   $477,530.39 

So in conclusion, the couple would need about $477 Thousand dollars to be able to retire at 50 years old for a basic no frail cost of living!

Note that in the above, for erring on the safe side, I assume:
(a)    The interest rate you would expect to earn on your savings to be just 1% (something like just fixed deposit interest rate).
(b)    The age by which the last of the couple can live till passing away to be 85 years old (since average age of man is only 80 while average age of woman is 85), so the “Number of years you would like to make monthly withdrawals” = 85 – 50 = 35.

Next, let’s calculate for another scenario, this is the one which most Singaporeans would like to have, a comfortable retirement (not luxury) life-style which most Singaporeans would deem to be pretty good enough for them!

According to Singapore’s household income statistics 2014 (from http://www.singstat.gov.sg/), your household would be top 20% earners if your household income is about $14500 and above.
Also, according to Singapore’s household expenditure statistics 2013, household with that kind of income spends on average about $7000 per month. However, this $7000 pm figure includes spendings on kids and/or parents, so I would say a figure of $6000 per month for the couple’s retirement would allow them to maintain their comfortable life-style.

Ok, using my online calculator again, you need to key in the following:

Amount you would like to withdraw each month in retirement ($):  6000
Annual Interest Rate you expect to earn on savings (in dec., eg 0.03 for 3%):  0.01
Number of years you would like to make monthly withdrawals:  35 
 
Then, you can click on “Calculate” and the online calculator will give you the output as:
This is how much you need to have saved by the time you retire ($):   $2,125,506.18

So in conclusion, if a couple is able to accumulate $2.12 Millions dollars, they would be able to retire at 50 years old with pretty comfortable life-style!

Note that I have not taken CPF Life payout (starting at 65 years old) into account, so in practise a couple need less than $2.12M to retire comfortably if you take into consideration that they will be receiving $1300 pm for man and $1200 pm for women starting from the age of 65 years old!

Also, for somebody who has $2.12M, they can afford to invest diversely and probably can get much better return than 1% from fixed deposit!

I have also made available some other online calculators which you may find them useful, and you can access them at this webpage:

Saturday, September 24, 2016

CPF Life Payout-Return Calculator Online

I have made available here a “CPF Life Payout-Return Online Calculator“ where you can calculate the payout you are supposed to receive based on the expected annuity return you desire (which should be 4% according to CPF) if you can live to certain age!

You can access the calculator online at this URL:
    http://make-money-secrets.blogspot.sg/p/cpf-life-payreturn.html

(You can also access from the link here:
https://make-money-secrets.blogspot.sg/p/my-online-calculators.html )

Note that there are 2 ways to use this CPF Life payout-return online calculator:

(a) You can compare the CPF Life payout you ACTUALLY receive to the CPF Life payout at desired return (calculated using this online calculator) to see whether you are being over-paid or under-paid for your participated annuity (based on the average life-span for men (80) and women (85)) if you key into "Age you expected to live until in (Years)" as 80 (for men) or 85 (for women).

(b) You can keep varying the input number of "CPF Life desired return you would like (%)" such that you get a % figure which gives a CPF Life payout (given by "CPF Life payout at desired return") which is same as the ACTUAL CPF Life payout amount. In this way, the % figure basically gives you the implied annuity return of your CPF Life (for a given "Age you expected to live until in (Years)", which we usually use 80 for men and 85 for women (this is the actual statistical life-span of Singapore's men and women).

This is for fun but the truth will shock you!

For example, if you have participate in the CPF Life Standard Plan’s Full Retirement Scheme (previous called the “Minimum Sum”) with an amount of $161,000 at 55 years old, then accordingly, you should get about $251,371 at 65 years old (after interest compounding).
Then from 65 years old,  CPF Life payout given by CPF which is about $1300 per month (for men), and if you project that you can only live till average age of 80 years old (80 for men (85 for women), because statistically only <=50% of Singaporean men can live pass 80 years old and similarly for women is 85 years old) and assuming bequest = $0 if you live till/pass average age (which is typical of such annuity programme), then the actual CPF Life annuity return you are getting is actually -0.88% (a NEGATIVE return)!

In other words, if a man wanted to get an annualized return of 4% from his CPF Life (with a capital of about $251,371 at 65 years old), he would need to live till 91 years old!  Think about it, how many Singaporean men out there can live till 91 years old?  I would postulate that chances are that only something like 1% of men would ever live pass 91 years old, while the statistics currently available, which you can read here:
    http://www.singstat.gov.sg/statistics/visualising-data/charts/life-expectancy-at-birth

It is clear that about 50% of men would die before they even hit 80 years old, and hence 50% of men would only have a CPF Life annuity return of -0.8%!

It would be interesting to know how many men actually could live pass 80 years old, 85 years old and 91 years old!