Introducing fidser. v4.0: Smarter Retirement Planning

Today we are releasing fidser. v4.0 - the biggest update we have shipped. The shape of the product is the same: you answer a few questions, you get a clear retirement forecast, you can explore what-ifs. What changed is what is happening underneath, and what you can now ask the planner to do.

Below is a tour of the new features, why we built each one, and who benefits most. If you would rather just open it and look around, the planner is at app.fidser.com.

Please note: This article is general educational information about features inside fidser., not personalised financial advice. Before making retirement decisions, consider speaking with a qualified financial adviser.

Two questions come up in almost every conversation about retirement: When can I actually retire? and How much can I sustainably spend each year? Until now, fidser. could help you answer those by trying different inputs and watching the projection move. v4.0 does the search for you.

For Pro plans, the planner now runs two constraint solvers automatically: one finds the earliest retirement date that still keeps your plan financially sustainable, and the other finds your maximum sustainable annual spending. The results sit at the top of your dashboard - a single, concrete answer rather than a chart you need to interpret.

Healthcare is the line item that breaks most retirement spreadsheets, and it is the single biggest blind spot for anyone retiring before 65. v4.0 models the full healthcare journey:

• ACA subsidies are estimated using your projected MAGI, so you can see how withdrawal decisions in your 50s and early 60s affect your premiums.
• Medicare premiums kick in automatically at age 65 with realistic Part B and Part D assumptions.
• IRMAA surcharges are flagged for higher earners, including the two-year lookback that catches a lot of people by surprise.
• Early-withdrawal penalties are calculated for funds accessed before 59½, with the standard exceptions (Rule 72(t), HSA distributions) accounted for.

If you have ever wondered "can I afford the bridge years from retirement to Medicare?", this section was built for you.

Most retirement calculators model federal tax and call it done. State income tax and capital gains rates can move your real take-home meaningfully - sometimes tens of thousands of dollars per year - and they shape relocation decisions that are common in retirement.

Pro plans now include state-by-state tax modeling for all 50 states. You can also model relocation as a scenario modification: "Move from California to Texas in 2030." The planner switches your tax profile in that year and recalculates every year that follows. The difference is often striking.

Roth conversions are one of the highest-leverage decisions for households between 50 and 70 - and one of the easiest to get wrong with back-of-envelope math, because the pro-rata rule and bracket interactions matter.

v4.0 lets you model specific conversion amounts as scenario modifications. The planner applies pro-rata calculations on your traditional-to-Roth balance mix, recalculates federal and state tax for the conversion year, and then carries the new account balances forward through your projection. You can compare scenarios side-by-side to find the conversion strategy that maximises your long-term outcome.

One of the most common pieces of feedback we hear is "the projection moved - I don't know why." v4.0 introduces Why Cards on the dashboard: short, specific explanations of what is driving the shape of your plan. Why your success probability changed when you adjusted spending. Why your peak tax year is where it is. Why your healthcare costs spike in a particular year. The cards are generated from the same year-by-year trace data that powers the projection - what you see is what the engine actually did.

fidser. is meant to give you a confident answer once a year, not a number to refresh every morning. v4.0 makes that explicit with a guided four-step annual review: refresh balances, look at the updated projection, revisit your scenarios and modeled tradeoffs, then mark the review complete. The dashboard tracks when you last reviewed so you know when it is time to come back.

Most retirement calculators quietly assume you will retire at 65. The fidser. forecast engine no longer makes that assumption. You can model retirement at 45, 55, 65, or anywhere in between, with extended modeling horizons through age 95, 100, 105, or 110. Combined with the new healthcare modeling and solver optimization, that means the planner now works for both traditional retirement timelines and early-retirement-style plans without breaking down on the bridge years.

Parker, our AI assistant for exploring scenarios in plain English, is in development and will return to fidser. soon. The infrastructure for it lives inside v4.0 already - we are getting the experience right before we open it back up. We will share more when it is ready.