Income Shortfall with Excess RMDs
Why would a plan show a shortfall in the same year that the client is reinvesting excess RMDs?
Last published on: October 31, 2025
The situation may happen due to the difference between how the "spending capacity" is calculated and how the projections in Life Hub are produced. Spending capacity, and the overall plan, are based on household resources and other plan settings, and is based on the risk of the overall plan, including the chances that returns and inflation are higher or lower than expected. That plan also includes guardrails/plans for adjustment to keep things on track.Â
Life Hub, on the other hand, shows deterministic straight-line appreciation and no adjustment in income. Here's an article on why this is the approach we've taken with that part of the app. This approach means that in Life Hub, there will sometimes appear to be "excess withdrawals" from RMDs and such that exceed the planned spending. But in fact, if you did receive the returns modeled in Life Hub, you probably would have increased spending, and so the excess would be gone or not so large. In general, as with any long projection, this means values decades out need to be taken with a grain of salt. If you ever want to create a plan that hits the desired income exactly in Life Hub, you can always use the "How can I spend $X?" setting.