Tideway Dual Account Drawdown Calculator
Our pension drawdown calculator is a handy tool designed to help you determine how long your pension pot might last as a flexible retirement income.
Guide to the Pension Drawdown Calculator
Guide to the Tideway Dual Account Drawdown Calculator
Who will the pension calculator be useful to?
This drawdown pension calculator is designed to help those who are going to use flexible drawdown as a means to generate income in retirement rather than buying an annuity. It looks at the sustainability of your expected withdrawals during your retirement. When using the calculator you should consider both regular income and capital needs. It shows what the likely residual value of your fund will be depending on how long you live.
What does the pension drawdown calculator show?
Enter your current pension fund as the starting drawdown value, then complete your age and next 5 years’ worth of expected withdrawals. You can vary the income each year and there are two further stages of your retirement which you can adjust to take account of other income sources such as your state pension or reduced expenditure as you get older.
One-off withdrawals and use of tax-free cash lump sums should be included in your expected annual withdrawals. Click “calculate” and on the graph below, a line will appear plotting the balance left in your pension drawdown account over time.
What is the Tideway Dual Account Drawdown?
For those individuals drawing higher levels of income from their pension arrangements, the Tideway Dual Account is there to help manage return sequencing risk (the risk of having to encash investments in a market down turn).
The first account holds a balance of approximately five years’ income needs. It is invested in short-term less volatile investments seeking a smoothed lower return. The second account will invest the remaining balance in a portfolio aiming to achieve both income and growth over the long term. Income and capital gains from this account will be moved to the first account to keep it topped up.
The calculator will project how much of your pension savings should be invested in each account. Read our GUIDE on how to manage return sequencing to learn more about it.
How do I know if my pension fund will run out?
If the balance goes to zero, your projected retirement fund has run dry and your income will stop at this age along the bottom (x) axis. If the line does not go to zero this shows that there will be residual a balance in the drawdown account.
You are able to adjust these figures again to illustrate different scenarios.
Important Tax & Investment Points to Consider When Using the Calculator
Tax Free Cash and Taxable Withdrawals
The drawdown calculator just looks at the gross withdrawals made from the pension fund, initially you may still have entitlement to your 25% tax free lump sum. After this withdrawals will be taxed as income before you receive them by your pension administrator.
Get Help and Advice
If you are in any doubt as to what is a reasonable income to plan to receive given the current size of your pension drawdown account, how long this income might be sustainable for given your life expectancy and how a one-off withdrawal will impact this, then please get in touch with one of our Wealth Managers.
IMPORTANT INFORMATION ABOUT OUR PENSION DRAWDOWN CALCULATOR
In an invested drawdown account your capital and the income it produces is at risk and can fall as well as rise, you may not get back all of your initial investment.
Excessive withdrawals will accelerate the decline of your pension drawdown account value, ultimately running it down to zero, after which further withdrawals will be impossible.
Any information contained within this page should not be deemed to constitute investment advice and should not be relied upon as the basis for a decision to enter into a transaction, or as the basis for any financial or investment decision. Investors should always seek professional advice in regard to the suitability of any investment transaction.
Tideway cannot be held responsible for any investment losses based on investment decisions made using this pension fund calculator without personalised advice from one of Tideway’s advisers.
Annuities Explained
What Are Annuities?
An annuity converts a capital sum into an income for life for an individual or couple, they are provided by UK authorised insurance companies and are very safe.
Who Can Buy Them?
With a pension fund you can buy them from age 55 up to age 75 and the income they produce will be taxed as income at your marginal tax rate. You can buy an annuity with capital outside of your pension fund, the income from which is not all deemed as taxable income a portion is deemed the return of your original capital and therefore not taxed.
What Are the Key Advantages of An Annuity?
The key advantages are:
- Security – they are risk free and you get a fixed income and paid for life, irrespective of how long you live.
- Lack of responsibility – once bought you have no further responsibilities over looking after you capital and creating the lifetime income, its all done for you by the insurance company.
- There are options for the annuity income to increase each year and to pay out to a spouse for their life if they should out live you, of course these must be paid for in the starting income rate you receive.
What Are the Key Disadvantages of An Annuity?
The key disadvantages are:
- You lose control of your capital, and they are irreversible transactions, you can never get your capital back during your lifetime (see Note 1 below)
- They are inflexible, you get some options at outset as to whether to buy a level income, one escalating by a fixed amount or one linked to inflation, but once made these decisions are permanent. You cannot increase your monthly payments or decrease or defer them
- Annuities are generally an expensive way to produce income because of the guarantees they offer. Returns from annuities will be particularly poor if you don’t live to an above average life expectancy. Because the insurance company has to guarantee the returns and continue to pay out to those who live longer than average annuity income rates are cautious and the returns you can make are limited to a return just over the yields on UK gilts even if you like well beyond age 90.
Why Are You Showing Me Annuity Rates in A Drawdown Calculator?
The annuity rate is a good place to start when you are considering embarking on income drawdown or, using drawdown in retirement where you are planning to generate a regular income for the rest of your life. Annuities are your ‘risk free’ option to create income in retirement and the rate of income you can buy is a good reference point and guide to sustainable drawdown rates (See Note 2).
In addition to the extra flexibility and control you get from using drawdown compared to an annuity, it should be possible to improve on the return and income offered by an annuity by:
- Holding your own risk of living beyond age 90, insuring against this risk by way of an annuity is expensive and your income needs beyond age 90 might be very different to those in the earlier years of retirement.
- Taking a modest amount of investment risk, it may not be achieved if too much investment risk is taken. In general terms the more risk you take the greater the possibility of failing to make the necessary return.
Note 3: the source of the annuity values is from Hargreaves Lansdown. You can review the data on their website.
Account 1: Short term
This account has a balance of approximately five years’ income needs. It is invested in short-term less volatile investments seeking a smoothed lower return – in this case, 4% per year return
Account 2: Long term
The remaining balance of the plan is invested in a portfolio aiming to achieve both income and growth over the long term. It will include more volatile assets. In this case 6% per year return.
Given your expected income requirements a single drawdown account is sufficient.
This is a projection of how long your money would last
Tideway Wealth Management Limited (TWM) is an appointed representative of Tideway Investment Partners LLP (TIP).
Tideway Investment Partners are authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FRN: 496214).
Tideway Investment Partners LLP is a limited liability partnership incorporated in England and Wales.
Registered address: 107 Leadenhall Street, London, EC3A 4AF, Registered number. OC343430. Tel +44 (0) 20 3143 6100.
