How to use the Future Wealth Time Machine
You do not need a finance background. Start with one question, change one assumption at a time, and compare what happens.
Create an account and choose a path
- Create an account with your email and a strong password.
- Open Time Machine if you already have numbers you want to test.
- Open Case Studies if you would rather learn from a realistic example first.
- Use My Plans to save and edit your own learning scenarios.
What each assumption means
Starting amount: money already in the scenario.
Monthly contribution: recurring amount added after any delay.
Annual return: a hypothetical growth assumption, never a guarantee.
Fees: modeled annual drag on returns.
Inflation: used to estimate future purchasing power.
Tax rate: simplified estimate on modeled gains.
Volatility: how widely randomized annual returns can vary in the Monte Carlo teaching model.
Contribution growth: how much the recurring contribution changes each year after it begins.
Contribution pause: an optional year and duration for temporarily stopping recurring contributions.
Reinvest earnings: choose whether modeled earnings stay invested or are treated as cash distributions.
Change one thing at a time
- Run the baseline.
- Reduce the return assumption.
- Increase fees and inflation.
- Delay starting by five years.
- Try the $5/day, $10/day, or $25/day saving-equivalent buttons.
- Model a temporary contribution pause and compare it with uninterrupted saving.
- Increase monthly contributions.
- Open Compare and edit all four futures side-by-side.
- Compare nominal value with inflation-adjusted value.
- Look at the Monte Carlo range instead of focusing on one result.
View Only vs. Save As
View Only preserves the learning case exactly as written.
Save As creates a private editable plan in your account. Change every number, rename it, add notes, simulate it, favorite it, and export its year-by-year projection.
Do not confuse precision with certainty
After-tax nominal: simplified modeled ending value after a basic tax estimate.
Inflation-adjusted: modeled value expressed in today's purchasing-power terms.
Monte Carlo percentiles: a teaching distribution generated from randomized assumptions. They are not personalized probabilities.
Start-now gap: the difference created when contributions begin later under otherwise similar assumptions.
Use this as education, not advice
The app does not know your complete finances, local laws, tax status, goals, risk tolerance, pension rules, investment products, debts, benefits, or family circumstances. Speak with appropriately qualified professionals for decisions that matter.
Never enter bank passwords, card numbers, brokerage credentials, Social Security numbers, national ID numbers, or other unnecessary sensitive information into plan notes.