Key takeaways
- Start from spending you would need in retirement, not from a viral “₹10 crore” headline.
- Inflation turns today’s monthly expense into a much larger number at retirement.
- EPF, NPS, PPF and market SIPs are different rulesets. Do not merge them into one fantasy rate.
- The monthly investment a planner shows is the amount that funds that plan if the assumptions hold.
“How much should I save?” is the wrong first question. The usable first question is: what would this household need to spend each year after work, in today’s rupees, and for how long? Only then does a corpus — and a monthly investment — mean anything.
Start with expenses, not with a corpus slogan
A corpus is a pile of money. Retirement is a stream of spending. Finaura’s retirement planner asks for current monthly expenses, then inflates them to retirement, then estimates how large a pile would support that stream until the end age you type. If you skip the expense step and jump to “I need ₹5 crore because someone on YouTube has ₹5 crore,” you have copied a lifestyle you have not measured.
The moving parts, in ordinary language
- Current monthly expenses: a sketch of the life you want to fund, not this month’s unusual bill.
- Retirement age and end age: how many years you will contribute, and how many years the corpus must last. End age is an assumption about longevity, not a prediction.
- Inflation: the rate at which that expense sketch grows before retirement (and often during it).
- Expected return before retirement: an assumed growth rate on savings while you still work.
- Expected return after retirement: often lower in illustrations, because the mix may be more conservative. It is still an assumption.
- Existing investments: a starting pile, which reduces how much you still need to add.
A worked sketch (not a recommendation)
Imagine someone 35, aiming to stop full-time work at 60, planning to age 90, spending ₹60,000 a month today, assuming 6% inflation, 10% return while working and 7% after retirement, with ₹20 lakh already invested. The planner will inflate ₹60,000 for 25 years, estimate a corpus at 60, subtract the future value of the ₹20 lakh under the pre-retirement rate, and then solve for a monthly contribution. Change inflation from 6% to 7% and the monthly number jumps. That jump is the lesson.
Where EPF, NPS and PPF fit
Salary already routes money into EPF for many employees. NPS has its own contribution and withdrawal structure. PPF has a 15-year design and a notified rate. Use the dedicated EPF, NPS and PPF calculators to see those engines, then treat the retirement planner as the household-level sketch that sits above them. Do not triple-count the same rupee in three tools and call it a plan.
Try it yourselfOpen the retirement plannerExpenses, ages, inflation, returns and existing savings — with a corpus and a monthly investment if the assumptions hold.What “enough” cannot mean here
Finaura cannot tell you that you are ready to retire. It does not know your health, dependents, debt or whether you will keep earning part-time. It can show that a 1% change in inflation or return moves the monthly saving by a large amount. That is useful. It is not a green light.