Professional retirement planning as a one-time $19+ purchase, not a $20-40/month subscription. Roth conversion ladders, Monte Carlo, ACA optimization, full 51-state tax across all four filing statuses, year-by-year drawdown Sankey. An affordable, privacy-first alternative to ProjectionLab, Boldin, MaxiFi, and YNAB. Runs locally on macOS, Windows, and Linux. No accounts. No telemetry.
After several years of dealing with fussy custom spreadsheets and my utter refusal to pay exorbitant monthly subscription fees for professional financial planning software, I decided to build my own web app.
Then, after several more months of utilizing it for my own modelling/analysis, I realized this thing might actually be good enough for others as well, so I turned it into a full-on desktop app.
The Retirology app was built with a few things in mind:
1. Be adaptable to as many retirement scenarios as possible.
2. Include all the pro-level tools competitors lock behind subscriptions.
3. No account or connections to external services.
4. No subscriptions ever.
What Retirology is capable of:
- Multi-bucket accumulation modelling covering over two dozen account types, with custom growth rates, employer match, and bond tent capabilities.
- Drawdown engine that runs year-by-year analysis and includes features such as Roth conversion ladders, ACA premium subsidy optimization, SEPP 72(t), RMD modelling, and Social Security planning.
- Full state and select locality tax modelling (NYC, Detroit, Maryland counties).
- Robust Monte Carlo stress testing.
- Income and budget tracking.
- A Sankey diagram that models full accumulation and drawdown phases into an easily understood cash flow visual.
- Side-by-side comparison table to see how multiple planning scenarios stack up.
As for the technical details, if you’re so inclined:
- Available on macOS, Windows, and Linux.
- All data stays local, saved in a SQLite file on your machine.
- No account, logic, or cloud sync.
- A single network call the app makes at launch to a version.json to check for updates.
- Backend is Python, FastAPI, Pydantic v2, SQLite, reportlab, and PyInstaller.
- Frontend is React 19, TypeScript, Electron 33, electron-vite + Vite 6, Tailwind CSS 4, Radix UI, and Recharts 3.
Happy to answer questions about any of it, and thank you in advance for checking it out!
After several years of dealing with fussy custom spreadsheets and my utter refusal to pay exorbitant monthly subscription fees for professional financial planning software, I decided to build my own web app.
Then, after several more months of utilizing it for my own modelling/analysis, I realized this thing might actually be good enough for others as well, so I turned it into a full-on desktop app.
The Retirology app was built with a few things in mind:
1. Be adaptable to as many retirement scenarios as possible.
2. Include all the pro-level tools competitors lock behind subscriptions.
3. No account or connections to external services.
4. No subscriptions ever.
Retirology is available via a one-time pay-what-you-want model, with a base price of $19. No matter what you pay, you will get indefinite in-year updates with the usual fixes and enhancements. The app is yours, forever, and will never stop working, ever.
Every year, a new standalone version of the app will be released as a separate purchase, which includes updated local and federal rules and regulations, such as the latest tax brackets. All current customers will automatically receive 100% off the 2027 version of the app.
I want to be clear, I am not releasing this app with plans to turn this into a business. Instead, my goal is to save people money by cancelling subscriptions for competing apps, with the added bonus of making a little cash on the side. So apologies if any of this sounds a bit unprofessional, but that's because it kind of is.
What Retirology is capable of:
- Multi-bucket accumulation modelling covering over two dozen account types, with custom growth rates, employer match, and bond tent capabilities.
- Drawdown engine that runs year-by-year analysis and includes features such as Roth conversion ladders, ACA premium subsidy optimization, SEPP 72(t), RMD modelling, and Social Security planning.
- Full state and select locality tax modelling (NYC, Detroit, Maryland counties).
- Robust Monte Carlo stress testing.
- Income and budget tracking.
- A Sankey diagram that models full accumulation and drawdown phases into an easily understood cash flow visual.
- Side-by-side comparison table to see how multiple planning scenarios stack up.
As for the technical details, if you’re so inclined:
- Available on macOS, Windows, and Linux.
- All data stays local, saved in a SQLite file on your machine.
- No account, logic, or cloud sync.
- A single network call the app makes at launch to a version.json to check for updates.
- Backend is Python, FastAPI, Pydantic v2, SQLite, reportlab, and PyInstaller.
- Frontend is React 19, TypeScript, Electron 33, electron-vite + Vite 6, Tailwind CSS 4, Radix UI, and Recharts 3.
Happy to answer questions about any of it, and thank you in advance for checking it out!
Love the no-paywall aspect to this. We need to normalize financial talk and education on this topic. According to a recent Acorns report, "44% of Americans (and 53% of young adults) believe that simply ignoring financial decisions reduces their stress." That is a scary finding.
Congratulations! As someone working on my own sci-fi novel, I thought your comment "I kept on tinkering because it was more comfortable than overcoming the fear of launching," was so damn true.
Just out of curiousity, did you attempt the traditional agent and publisher route and if so any learnings you'd be willing to share with someone who'd like to go down that route?
Just out of curiosity, are you referring to the app itself or the website? I am now realizing that my own website shares similar design elements, so I assume that is what you're referring to, but I think the app is pretty solid and distinct.
Very cool, this is something that feels like it should be so much more ubiquitous than it unfortunately is. The financial health/wellness space seems to be heating up, so best of luck in your roll out.
Any future enhancements planned around financial analysis or are you focused on interactive education?