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NewRetirement Review: Financial Planning Tools For Retirement

By Erin Gobler

🗓️

Updated: January 03, 2024

Couple reading retirement plan at home with use of laptop

NewRetirement review: Financial planning tools for retirement

goodluz / Shutterstock

By Erin Gobler

🗓️

Updated: January 03, 2024

Partners on this page provide us earnings.

NewRetirement is a tool designed to help ease your anxiety around retirement planning. This platform helps you build a customized retirement plan and make sure that you're on track to retire comfortably. But how does NewRetirement work and is it right for you? Here's our NewRetirement review.

4.0

Cost4.5

Customer service4.5

Ease of use 3.5

Tools and resources5

Synchronization3

NewRetirement helps people plan for retirement with planning tools, educational content, and a community of like-mind investors. Its goal is to give you all the tools you need to help you save and invest for retirement.

What is NewRetirement?

NewRetirement is a website and planning tool that helps people financially prepare for retirement. The company was founded in 2015 by Steven Chen. After he and his brother couldn't find the online tools to help their mother save for retirement, Steve decided to create one himself.

Today, NewRetirement specializes in offering affordable retirement planning tools, educational content, and a community of like-minded investors who are working to become more confident in their finances and achieve financial independence.

What does it offer?

NewRetirement offers a subscription service to help you plan and save for retirement.

It offers three subscription plans:

Free Planner

First, NewRetirement offers a free plan to help you see where you stand financially and prepare for retirement. With this free plan you can use many of the website tools to track your accounts, plan for retirement and see how strong your plan is.

PlannerPlus – $96 per year with a 14-day free trial

NewRetirement's PlannerPlus plan is the most popular one it offers. With the PlannerPlus you can do all of the same things you would with the free plan, with the addition of many other tools. Some of the additions include:

Creating a detailed budget
Linking your bank and brokerage accounts
Modeling transactions such as real estate and Roth conversions
Getting detailed tax analysis
Downloading your data
Stress testing your plan
Finding the best withdrawal strategies

PlannerPlus Live – $396 per year with a 14-day free trial

The PlannerPlus Live plan is the most expensive plan it offers. It includes everything that comes with the PlannerPlus plan, with the addition of two Zoom sessions with a planner expert to help you create the best possible retirement plan for you.

Other services

NewRetirement also offers add-on services to its customers. First, users get one-on-one product support via a Zoom call. You can use these calls to set up your retirement plan, stress test it and ask questions. Zoom calls are $150 per session but if you have the PlannerPlus Live plan you get two free calls. You can also work with a financial advisor to create a personalized retirement plan for $999.

In addition to its subscription plans and add-on services, NewRetirement also offers a variety of other free tools investors can use to plan for the future. And the company has a large library of educational resources to answer your retirement planning questions. And there is a variety of financial calculators that are free to use regardless of whether you have a NewRetirement account.

Main features

NewRetirement has a number of features to help you plan for the future. Here are a few of its tools:

Dashboard

Your NewRetirement dashboard is your first stop on the company's website. You'll quickly see information about your plan's health, including your income score and your chances of meeting your retirement goals.

On the dashboard, you'll also see a comparison of your income vs. expenses during retirement, your net worth and a handful of coach suggestions to help you improve your financial plan.

An example of a NewRetirement account dashboard.

Retirement planner

The retirement planner is really the bread and butter of NewRetirement. When you sign up, you enter your information and see whether you're on track for retirement.

Then you can get to work creating your comprehensive financial plan. This includes your accounts and assets, home, debts, income, expenses, health care, cash flow, estate plan, financial goals and more.

Insight library

Another of NewRetirement's top features is its insights library, which can help you see projections about your retirement and use various charting tools.

Some of the tools in the library include:

Lifetime retirement projection
Cash flow forecast
Savings needed forecast
Net worth
Average retirement income vs. expenses
“What if” scenarios
Social Security explorer
Monte Carlo analysis
Roth conversion explorer

Tips for improving your plan

Finally, NewRetirement gives you plenty of tips to help you improve your financial plan. Tips fall into three different categories: figuring out how to have enough savings, preparing for risks and unknowns, and maximizing your wealth.

This section of the website offers lots of advice. You can start where you are now by reading up on the tips that apply most to your current life. Then the rest will be waiting for you when you get to the next phase in your financial journey.

How does it work?

No matter which plan you choose, you'll be able to see where you stand financially today and create a plan for retirement.

There are two different paths you can take. First, NewRetirement offers a quick assessment where you enter just a few details about yourself and your financial situation. Based on the estimates you provide, NewRetirement tells you how good your chances are of funding your retirement.

From there, it recommends some next steps to help get you on the right track. Alternatively, you can choose a more comprehensive tool where you share more information. It takes only a few minutes but gives you a more accurate idea of where you stand today.

Once you complete all of the necessary information, NewRetirement gives you plenty of tips for how you can improve your financial plan. And it invites you to try the premium subscription plans.

Who is it for?

NewRetirement is an excellent tool to help you create a comprehensive financial plan to ensure you're prepared for retirement. Because retirement is the most expensive financial goal most of us will save for, anyone could benefit from this plan.

What's great about NewRetirement is that many of the tools come with the free plan. So even if you aren't ready to pay for a financial planning tool, you still get a lot of benefit from it. As a result, this free plan is perfect for anyone who wants a little guidance planning for retirement or some assurance they're on the right track.

The paid plans could be well suited for anyone who has a more complicated financial situation or who wants a bit more personalized help building their financial plan.

How do I open an account?

Signing up for a NewRetirement plan is easy. You simply enter an email address and password. From there, you're prompted to complete either the quick or comprehensive retirement planning questionnaire. Once you answer all the questions, you arrive at your dashboard to see whether you're on track for retirement.

When you sign up for NewRetirement, you automatically have the free plan. But you have the option to upgrade to one of the paid plans or purchase one of the other premium add-on services.

How's the customer service?

If you need assistance with your NewRetirement account or have questions for the company, you have several options to contact someone.

First, you can email customer support anytime at customer_service@newretirement.com. You can also call the company toll-free at 866-441-0246. Finally, you can use the chatbox on the company's website to speak with a representative. According to the company's website, they usually respond to chats within a few hours.

And a unique way that NewRetirement serves its customers is through a Facebook group. There are more than 6,000 members in the group. And you can ask questions about NewRetirement and personal finance in general.

Finally, in addition to the general customer support, NewRetirement offers financial help to those who need it. Users of the free plan can receive email and in-app support during business hours, as well as through group classes. PlannerPlus customers can purchase one-on-one coaching or fiduciary advisor services. And PlannerPlus Live customers receive two free Zoom sessions with a planner expert.

Is it safe?

Yes, NewRetirement is safe to use. The company uses bank-level security and industry best practices to help keep your data secure. NewRetirement uses 128-bit encryption for communication between your browser and its servers. The website's encryption has an A+ rating from Qualys SSL Labs.

Another important consideration is what NewRetirement does with your data. First, the company doesn't allow employees to access your credentials. It uses strict internal access controls. And it doesn't sell your data, provide personal data to third parties or share your data except to improve its products and services.

Finally, when it comes to linking with other accounts, NewRetirement partners with Plaid, which is one of the industry leaders for secure account linking.

Pros and cons of NewRetirement

Pros

Lots of free tools: Many of NewRetirement's tools are free to use. And this means anyone can benefit from them.
Easy to sign up: It takes only a few minutes to complete NewRetirement's initial assessment.
Extra support: For investors who want extra guidance, there are Zoom support calls and financial advisory services for an increased cost.
Comprehensive dashboard: NewRetirement's dashboard is incredibly comprehensive, even for free users. You'll see plenty of tips for how to improve your financial plan.

Cons

Will need to pay for advanced features: Many of NewRetirements tools and simulators, including the budgeting tool, require a paid subscription.
Can't link your accounts with the free version: The free tool doesn't allow you to link your accounts. That's available only with the paid tool.
No wealth management services: NewRetirement doesn't offer wealth management services like some of its competitors in the retirement planning space.

Best alternatives

Many of the NewRetirement features are similar to those Personal Capital offers. These include robust financial tools to help you plan for retirement, track your spending and calculate your net worth.

But there are some important differences. First, Personal Capital offers wealth management services. You can hire an advisor to manage your investments for you and work closely with you to help you save for retirement. But you get this only if you have a large number of investable assets.

Additionally, while Personal Capital's basic tools are all free to use, they aren't nearly as comprehensive as NewRetirement's. It offers the basic tools you find with NewRetirement's free plan but without the personalized advice and without the more robust tools that come with NewRetirement's paid plans.

The bottom line: Is it worth it?

NewRetirement has plenty of great things going for it, including the free tools and paid subscription plans. Because of how robust the dashboard and advice are even with the free plan, it's definitely worth it to enter your information and at least find out if you're on track for retirement.

And those who feel they need a little more help or who have more complicated financial situations will likely find the paid plans worth it. After all, the PlannerPlus plan comes out to just $8 per month.

That being said, before signing up for any financial tool, it's important to do your own research into the company to ensure that the services it offers are in line with what you're actually looking for.

Erin Gobler Freelance Contributor

Erin Gobler is a freelance personal finance based in Madison, Wisconsin. After seven years working in state politics, she left to pursue writing full-time. Now she writes about financial topics including mortgages and investing.

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