Wealth Curve – User guide

Getting started

Open the app at Launch app. You can use Wealth Curve with local storage only (data stays on this device) or sign in to save and sync models to your account.

Create a new model from the models list. You can start with a blank model or an example model that includes sample income, expenses and two portfolios so you can see how everything works before entering your own numbers.

The app is organized into tabs that walk you through each part of a forecast model. Use the Next button at the bottom of each tab to move forward, or use the sidebar to jump to any tab.

Models list

The models list shows all your forecast models. Each card displays the model name, description, start year/age, projection years, portfolio count, one-off events, override count and created/updated dates.

Use the Create New Forecast Model card to add a model. Click any existing model to open its Overview tab. Use the storage toggle at the top to switch between local storage and cloud (sign-in required for cloud).

Storage and sign-in

With Local storage only, all models are stored in your browser. They will not sync to other devices and may be lost if you clear site data.

Turn off the local-storage toggle and sign in to save models to your account and sync across devices. Sign-in is required to use cloud storage. You can switch between local and cloud storage at any time from the models list.

Passphrase setup & unlocking

When you first sign in and enable cloud storage, Wealth Curve uses end-to-end encryption to protect your financial data. This means your models are encrypted before they leave your device, and only you can decrypt them.

Setting up your passphrase

The first time you enable synced storage, you'll be asked to create a 4-word passphrase. This passphrase is used to encrypt your data:

Choose 4 words from the provided list. The words are randomly selected from a curated word list.
You can refresh the word list if you want different options.
Select your 4 words in order to build your passphrase.
Copy your passphrase to save it securely (the copy button appears once you've selected all 4 words).
Confirm that you've written down your passphrase before continuing.

Important: Write down your passphrase and store it securely. If you lose your passphrase, your encrypted data cannot be recovered—we can't decrypt it, and neither can anyone else. This is by design for security.

Unlocking your vault

After setting up your passphrase, or when accessing Wealth Curve on a different device or after clearing your browser cache, you'll need to unlock your vault:

Enter your 4-word passphrase in the unlock screen.
You can type the words in any order—the app will automatically move to the next field as you type.
If you make a mistake, you'll see an error message. Check your words and try again.
Once unlocked, you'll have access to all your synced models.

If you're using local storage only, you won't need a passphrase—your data stays on your device and isn't encrypted.

Overview tab

The Overview tab is where you configure the basic identity and timeframe for your model:

Model Name — a descriptive name for this forecast (e.g. "Retirement at 55" or "Base Plan").
Description — optional notes about what this model represents.
Starting Age — your current age (used to display age alongside each projection year).
Starting Year — the first year of the forecast (defaults to the current year for new models).
Number of Years to Project — how many years to run the forecast (1–100).

Changes auto-save as you type. Use Next to continue to Income & Expenses.

Income & expenses

This tab sets the baseline financial inputs that drive the entire projection:

Monthly Income Take-Home — your net (after-tax) monthly income. This is the starting value; it grows each year by the income increase rate.
Monthly Expenses — your total recurring monthly costs. This should include mortgage principal & interest (P&I), insurance, utilities, groceries, subscriptions and other regular spending. When your mortgage is paid off, the engine automatically reduces expenses by the P&I amount.
Inflation Rate — the annual rate applied to expenses each year (e.g. 2.5%). The long-term U.S. average is approximately 3%.
Income Increase Rate — the annual rate applied to income each year (e.g. 3%). The long-term average is approximately 3–4% per year.

Both rates compound annually. For example, at 3% inflation, $5,000/month in expenses becomes $5,150/month in year 2, $5,305 in year 3 and so on. You can override income or expenses for specific years later in the Retirement & Overrides tab.

Portfolios

Add one or more investment portfolios to track your savings and investments over time. For each portfolio you configure:

Name — a label for this portfolio (e.g. "401(k)", "Brokerage", "529 Plan").
Category — one of three types that affect how the engine handles withdrawals:
- Non-Retirement — taxable brokerage accounts. Drawn from first when you have a regular cash-flow deficit.
- Retirement — tax-advantaged accounts (401k, IRA, etc.). Drawn from second when non-retirement funds are insufficient.
- College Savings — education-earmarked accounts (529 plans, etc.). Drawn from first to cover education expenses specifically.
Current Balance — the starting balance for this portfolio.
Expected Return (CAGR) — the compound annual growth rate you expect (e.g. 7% for equities).
Monthly Deposit — how much you contribute each month.
Yearly Deposit Increase — the annual rate at which your monthly deposit grows (e.g. 3% to keep pace with salary increases).

Each year, the engine calculates: (start balance + annual deposits) × (1 + CAGR). When your cash flow goes negative, the engine draws from portfolios automatically (see How the engine works).

Primary home

Optionally model your primary residence. This tracks your home value, mortgage paydown and home equity over the projection:

Current Home Value — your home's estimated current market value.
Home Value Growth (CAGR) — expected annual appreciation rate (e.g. 3%).
Mortgage Balance — your current remaining mortgage balance.
Mortgage Rate — your annual interest rate.
Monthly Payment — your monthly mortgage payment (principal + interest).
Years Remaining — how many years are left on the mortgage.

The engine runs a full 12-month amortization each projection year, splitting your payment into principal and interest. When the mortgage balance reaches zero, the engine automatically detects the payoff year and reduces your monthly expenses by the P&I amount from that year forward.

Home equity is calculated as home value minus mortgage balance and is included in your total net worth.

Non-recurring expenses

Non-recurring expenses are one-time costs that occur in a specific year of your projection. Examples include a car purchase, home renovation or big vacation.

For each entry you specify a year, description and amount. You can add as many as you need and filter the list by year using the dropdown.

Quick templates

The templates section provides pre-filled entries for common life events. Click a template to populate the form with default values that you can adjust:

New Car — $35,000
Home Renovation — $50,000
Big Vacation — $10,000
Moving / Relocation — $8,000

Non-recurring expenses are added to your total expenses for the year they occur. They are separate from education expenses, which have their own tab.

Non-recurring income

Non-recurring income represents one-time or limited-duration income events in specific years. Examples include selling a home, receiving an inheritance or RSU vesting schedules.

Each entry has a year, description and amount.

Quick templates

Home Sale — $200,000 (single year)
Inheritance / Gift — $100,000 (single year)
Stock Vest / RSU — $25,000/year (multi-year, default 4 years). You specify the starting year, number of years and amount per year. The template creates one entry for each year of the vesting schedule.
Severance / Bonus — $25,000 (single year)

Multi-year templates (like RSU vesting) create multiple individual entries, one per year. You can edit or delete each entry independently after creation.

Education expenses

Education expenses are a special category of one-time costs for tuition and education-related spending. They are tracked separately because the forecast engine handles them differently: education expenses draw from college-savings portfolios first (e.g. 529 plans) before pulling from other accounts.

Each entry has a year, description and amount.

Quick templates

Education templates are multi-year by default. You specify a starting year, number of years and yearly cost:

4-Year College — $35,000/year for 4 years
2-Year Grad School — $25,000/year for 2 years
Private K–12 — $15,000/year (customizable duration)

When education expenses exceed your college-savings portfolio balance, the remainder is drawn from retirement accounts, then non-retirement accounts. This mirrors the real-world priority of using dedicated education funds before dipping into other savings.

Retirement & overrides

The Retirement & Overrides tab is one of the most powerful features in Wealth Curve. It lets you customize any year of the projection with specific values, and includes templates for common retirement and life-change scenarios.

Year overrides

For any year in your projection, you can override the engine's calculated values with your own numbers. Each override uses a checkbox + value pattern: check the box to activate the override, then enter your value. Available overrides:

Monthly Income Take-Home — replace the calculated income for that year.
Monthly Expenses — replace the calculated expenses (the engine auto-reduces expenses when a mortgage pays off).
Portfolio Start Balance — set a specific starting balance for any portfolio in that year.
Portfolio CAGR — change the expected return for a specific portfolio in that year.
Portfolio Monthly Deposit — change the deposit amount for a specific portfolio.
Home Value — set a specific home value for that year.
Mortgage Balance — set a specific mortgage balance.

Each override shows the baseline value (what the engine would have calculated) alongside your override so you can see the difference. The Active Overrides summary table gives you a quick view of all overrides across all years.

Override cascading

Overrides cascade forward. When you override income in a given year, that override becomes the new baseline for subsequent years. The engine applies your growth rates starting from the overridden value. For example, if your calculated income in year 5 would be $8,000/month but you override it to $6,000, year 6 will grow from $6,000 (not $8,000). This continues until you set another override.

Retirement template

The Retire at Age template is the fastest way to model retirement. You configure:

Retirement Age — the age at which you stop working (30–100).
Monthly Retirement Income — post-retirement income such as Social Security or pension payments.

When applied, the template automatically:

Sets your monthly income to the retirement income amount starting at the retirement year.
Sets all portfolio monthly deposits to $0 from the retirement year onward (since you are no longer contributing).

Income rampdown template

The Income Rampdown template models a gradual reduction in income over several years (e.g. transitioning to part-time before full retirement). You configure:

Start Rampdown at Age — when to begin reducing income (30–100).
Number of Rampdown Years — how many years the transition takes (1–10).
Final Monthly Income — the income level at the end of the rampdown.

The template creates overrides that reduce income evenly over the specified number of years from your current income down to the final amount.

Expense rampdown template

The Expense Rampdown template models a gradual reduction in expenses over time (e.g. downsizing lifestyle in retirement). You configure:

Start Reducing at Age — when to begin reducing expenses (30–100).
Annual Reduction % — the percentage to reduce expenses each year (0.5–20%).
Number of Years — how long the reduction continues (1–30).

Each year the reduction is applied to that year's baseline (including inflation from the prior year). So at $4,000 with 2.5% inflation and 5% reduction: year 1 is $3,800 (4000×0.95), year 2 is $3,895×0.95 (baseline $4,100 after inflation), year 3 uses that year's inflated baseline×0.95 and so on.

Early mortgage payoff template

The Early Mortgage Payoff template lets you model paying off your mortgage ahead of schedule. Select the payoff year from a dropdown and the template:

Sets the mortgage balance to $0 in that year.
Automatically reduces your monthly expenses by the mortgage P&I amount from that year forward.

Auto-generated overrides

Some overrides are created automatically by the engine and marked with an "Auto" badge. The most common example is the mortgage payoff expense reduction: when the engine detects that your mortgage is fully paid, it auto-generates an override to reduce your expenses. You can always clear or modify auto-generated overrides.

Comments and notes

Each year has a comments field where you can add notes about why you set certain overrides, or remind yourself of assumptions. Comments can exist even without active overrides.

Projection

The Projection tab is where everything comes together. It shows the results of your forecast in multiple views:

Standard view

A year-by-year table with columns for year, age, income, base expenses, non-recurring expenses, total expenses, portfolio value, primary home equity and total net worth. Click any row to expand it and see detailed breakdowns:

Cash Flow — income breakdown, spending breakdown and net cash available.
Portfolio Activity — open balance, contributions, withdrawals, growth and close balance for each portfolio.
Home & Mortgage — home value, mortgage balance and home equity.
Net Worth — portfolio totals, home equity and combined total net worth.

Pivoted view

A holistic view that shows each metric as a row across all years, making it easy to compare trends horizontally.

Chart view

Visual charts of your projection data over time.

You can open the year-override or one-off modals directly from the projection table to tweak values and instantly see the effect on your forecast.

What If analysis

On the Projection tab, switch to the What If tab to explore temporary changes to your assumptions without modifying the actual model. Click the dials icon to open the What If Assumptions modal, where you can adjust:

Inflation rate
Income increase rate
Home appreciation rate
Mortgage rate
Per-portfolio CAGR, monthly deposit and deposit increase

Changes are applied instantly to the projection, snapshot card and charts. The dials icon glows amber when overrides are active so you always know you are in What If mode.

Use Reset to Base to clear all What If changes. Nothing is saved — switching back to the Base Projection tab restores the original numbers. This makes it safe to explore "what if inflation is 5%?" or "what if my returns drop to 4%?" without changing your actual model.

YAML export

From the Model Actions menu (the ⋯ button in the header), choose Export YAML to generate a clean, readable snapshot of your entire model: assumptions, portfolios, one-off events, year overrides and projection results. The YAML is copied to your clipboard and displayed in a modal so you can review it.

The export is especially useful as a pastable format for AI conversations. Copy the YAML into your favorite AI assistant (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, etc.) and ask it to review your planning assumptions, suggest adjustments, stress-test scenarios or explain the projection results. Because YAML is structured yet human-readable, the AI can parse every detail of your model without any extra setup.

How the forecast engine works

Understanding how the engine calculates your projection helps you make better use of overrides and interpret the results. The engine runs year by year, with each year depending on the previous year's outputs.

Income growth

Your base monthly income compounds annually by the income increase rate: income = monthlySalary × (1 + incomeRate)^yearIndex. If you set an override in a given year, that override becomes the new starting point and subsequent years grow from it.

Expense growth

Monthly expenses compound annually by the inflation rate: expenses = monthlyExpenses × (1 + inflationRate)^yearIndex. As with income, overrides reset the baseline. When the mortgage is paid off, expenses are automatically reduced by the principal & interest portion of your mortgage payment.

Portfolio growth

Each portfolio grows as: (startBalance + annualDeposits) × (1 + CAGR). Monthly deposits can increase each year by the yearly deposit increase rate. Portfolios fall into three categories that determine withdrawal priority (see below).

Deficit handling

When your annual expenses exceed your income (negative cash flow), the engine draws from your portfolios to cover the shortfall:

Education expenses are covered first from college-savings portfolios, then retirement, then non-retirement accounts.
Regular deficits (non-education) are covered first from non-retirement portfolios, then retirement accounts.

This mirrors real-world best practices: use dedicated education funds for tuition, and draw from taxable accounts before tax-advantaged retirement accounts.

Mortgage amortization

The engine runs a full 12-month amortization schedule each projection year, splitting your monthly payment into principal and interest. It automatically detects the payoff year when the balance reaches zero and reduces your expenses accordingly.

Net worth

Total net worth is calculated as: non-retirement portfolios + retirement portfolios + home equity, where home equity is home value − mortgage balance.

Templates reference

Wealth Curve includes quick templates throughout the app to help you add common scenarios with sensible defaults. All values are fully editable after applying a template.

Non-recurring expense templates

New Car — $35,000
Home Renovation — $50,000
Big Vacation — $10,000
Moving / Relocation — $8,000

Non-recurring income templates

Home Sale — $200,000
Inheritance / Gift — $100,000
Stock Vest / RSU — $25,000/year (multi-year, 1–10 years)
Severance / Bonus — $25,000

Education expense templates

4-Year College — $35,000/year for 4 years
2-Year Grad School — $25,000/year for 2 years
Private K–12 — $15,000/year (customizable duration)

Retirement & override templates

Retire at Age — set retirement age and monthly retirement income; auto-zeroes portfolio deposits
Income Rampdown — gradual income reduction over 1–10 years
Expense Rampdown — same % reduction applied to each year's inflated baseline over 1–30 years
Early Mortgage Payoff — set payoff year; auto-reduces expenses by P&I

Building a complex model

Here is a step-by-step walkthrough for building a realistic, comprehensive forecast. This example models a family planning for retirement, children's education and major life events.

1. Set your baseline

In the Overview tab, set your current age, starting year and project out 40–50 years to cover through retirement. In Income & Expenses, enter your current monthly take-home pay and total monthly expenses. Set inflation to around 2.5–3% and income growth to 3–4%.

2. Add your portfolios

Create portfolios for each real account:

A 401(k) or IRA with category Retirement, your current balance, expected return (e.g. 7%), monthly contribution and yearly increase.
A brokerage account with category Non-Retirement for taxable investments.
A 529 plan with category College Savings if you are saving for education.

3. Model your home

In the Primary Home tab, enter your home value, expected appreciation and full mortgage details. The engine will amortize the mortgage and automatically detect the payoff year.

4. Add education expenses

In the Education Expenses tab, use the 4-Year College template. Set the starting year to when your child turns 18, adjust the yearly cost and duration. The engine will draw from your 529 (college-savings) portfolio first.

5. Plan for retirement

In the Retirement & Overrides tab, open Quick Templates and apply Retire at Age. Set your target retirement age (e.g. 55) and expected monthly retirement income (Social Security, pension, etc.). The template will zero out your income and portfolio contributions from that age forward.

6. Add an income rampdown

If you plan to transition gradually, apply the Income Rampdown template. For example, start ramping down at age 53 over 2 years to simulate going part-time before fully retiring at 55.

7. Add major life events

In Non-Recurring Expenses, add events like a car purchase every 7–8 years, a home renovation or a big vacation. In Non-Recurring Income, add expected events like RSU vesting (use the multi-year template) or a planned home sale.

8. Review and stress-test

Go to the Projection tab and review the year-by-year results. Expand rows to see detailed breakdowns. Look for years where your net worth dips or cash flow goes negative.

Switch to the What If tab to stress-test: what happens if inflation is 4% instead of 2.5%? What if your portfolio returns only 5% instead of 7%? What if you retire 3 years later? Explore different scenarios without changing your base model.

Use Export YAML to snapshot your model and share it with an AI assistant for review or discussion.