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I had trouble finding a good FI planning and simulation tool that could model things in enough detail to finally ditch my spreadsheets... so I built one. Would

I had trouble finding a good FI planning and simulation tool that could model things in enough detail to finally ditch my spreadsheets... so I built one. Would love it if any of you want to try it out. It does not involve linking any accounts and almost all the functionality is free. And if anyone wants to become a beta tester for the few premium features, you can use coupon code BETA-6001 for 60% off :) https://projectifi.io/ https://projectifi.io/

CannisterFlux 5y ago
Having "choose your theme" as almost the first question felt very out of place. Like, someone is really proud of those themes, more than any other part of the site :) I'd just leave that out completely, the default theme is fine and you can change it from the menu anyway. Everything else was really slick, but I didn't understand any of the goals (not in the US).
- Faaak 5y ago
  Same here. I though: "WTF is this ? Am I on a design your webpage site ?"
tjbiddle 5y ago
I've been stuck on "Confirming Subscription" for the last 5 minutes Edit: Tried again, but with PayPal, and it worked.
HDMI_Cable 5y ago
I love the website, (it actually helps a lot). I think there should be some way to print out the plans, to be used in real-life planning. Also, it would be nice if there was some sort of disclaimer on how the financial data we input is used, because that stuff can be sensitive, and could peer people off.
samtimalsina 5y ago
I've always wanted to build a tool like this, but never went around to it. I am a FIRE nerd, and have used and tried many FI tools. I am an active YNABer and I was looking for a tool for longterm planning. This looked interesting enough that I actually went ahead and got the premium plan for a year. Thanks for the coupon code. It came out at roughly $12/year, which I think is a great value to the kind of insights you can get. To create something like this on my own would take months, if not years. I also like the fact that I am not linking this to any of my real accounts.
zwass 5y ago
This will be an incredibly useful tool for me. I subscribed with the coupon code, and hope to see you continuing to develop the functionality.
Eridrus 5y ago
I had the same experience and even tinkered around with building this myself! IMO the biggest problem with existing calculators, and yours, is that you have to make some pretty strong assumptions about the future. How will rental & housing prices grow? What returns will I get on my investments? Depending on the numbers you put in you will get very different results, and most people are not good at predicting these! I think the real value here will be to find a way to reduce the number of knobs that users have to specify in some way, with either expert estimates for these variables, or joint distributions of these variables so that users can explore scenarios like "stock market crash" without having to figure out how that could impact every variable.
- scubakid 5y ago
  You're right about those user estimates and various knobs having a potentially huge effect on results. When I introduce a Monte Carlo simulation mode, I hope to be able to offer better insights into how distributions around some of these variables will impact likelihood of success. I'll also continue to look for opportunities to create smart defaults and/or links to resources that can be used to help calibrate estimates based on historical data, locality, etc. Thanks for the comment!

CannisterFlux 5y ago

Having "choose your theme" as almost the first question felt very out of place. Like, someone is really proud of those themes, more than any other part of the site :) I'd just leave that out completely, the default theme is fine and you can change it from the menu anyway. Everything else was really slick, but I didn't understand any of the goals (not in the US).

Faaak 5y ago
Same here. I though: "WTF is this ? Am I on a design your webpage site ?"

tjbiddle 5y ago

I've been stuck on "Confirming Subscription" for the last 5 minutes Edit: Tried again, but with PayPal, and it worked.

HDMI_Cable 5y ago

I love the website, (it actually helps a lot). I think there should be some way to print out the plans, to be used in real-life planning. Also, it would be nice if there was some sort of disclaimer on how the financial data we input is used, because that stuff can be sensitive, and could peer people off.

samtimalsina 5y ago

I've always wanted to build a tool like this, but never went around to it. I am a FIRE nerd, and have used and tried many FI tools. I am an active YNABer and I was looking for a tool for longterm planning. This looked interesting enough that I actually went ahead and got the premium plan for a year. Thanks for the coupon code. It came out at roughly $12/year, which I think is a great value to the kind of insights you can get. To create something like this on my own would take months, if not years. I also like the fact that I am not linking this to any of my real accounts.

zwass 5y ago

This will be an incredibly useful tool for me. I subscribed with the coupon code, and hope to see you continuing to develop the functionality.

Eridrus 5y ago

I had the same experience and even tinkered around with building this myself! IMO the biggest problem with existing calculators, and yours, is that you have to make some pretty strong assumptions about the future. How will rental & housing prices grow? What returns will I get on my investments? Depending on the numbers you put in you will get very different results, and most people are not good at predicting these! I think the real value here will be to find a way to reduce the number of knobs that users have to specify in some way, with either expert estimates for these variables, or joint distributions of these variables so that users can explore scenarios like "stock market crash" without having to figure out how that could impact every variable.

scubakid 5y ago
You're right about those user estimates and various knobs having a potentially huge effect on results. When I introduce a Monte Carlo simulation mode, I hope to be able to offer better insights into how distributions around some of these variables will impact likelihood of success. I'll also continue to look for opportunities to create smart defaults and/or links to resources that can be used to help calibrate estimates based on historical data, locality, etc. Thanks for the comment!