Same returns. Different order. Different life.
Two portfolios earn the exact same average over thirty years, but one hits its bad decade first, while you’re drawing it down. That order is the biggest risk to an early exit, and it’s why I count 3.33%, not 4%.
Explain it like I’m five
Good years and bad years arrive in an order nobody controls. If the bad ones come first, right when you’ve stopped working and started taking money out, the pot shrinks so early it may never catch up. Same years, different order, different ending. This page lets you watch it happen.
New to all of it? This idea is stop 9 of Start from zero: ten short lessons that assume nothing.
The First Bad Decade
Drawing €30,000 a year (3.33% of the pot), real.
The bad-first path, by rate
Same returns, reversed
€113k bad decade first
The lucky twin (same returns, best decade first) ends with €2.4M. Identical average. The only difference is which decade arrived while you were drawing the pot down.
A stylised bad-vs-good decade, not a forecast: the same set of yearly returns in reverse order, so the only difference is timing. Real markets are messier; for the full stress test, including whether you'd be alive to see it, see The Three Endings. Not advice.
Common questions
- Both lines earn the same returns. Why does one run out?
- Because of the order, not the amount. Both average exactly the same; the one that hits its bad years first is selling investments while they’re down, early on, and never fully recovers. Same returns, reversed — that’s the whole point.
- Is “runs dry, year 18” a prediction?
- No. It’s a stylised illustration of what order does, not a forecast of your money. The returns here are a made-up sequence and its exact reverse. It’s a lesson about risk, not a crystal ball.
- Why does 4% fail where 3.3% survives?
- Because a bigger yearly withdrawal leaves less cushion for a bad early decade. The classic “4% rule” (25× your spending) can just about work but it’s fragile; drawing 3.3% (30×) instead gives the pot room to survive an unlucky order. That’s why I lean to 30×, not 25×.
- Wouldn’t I just spend less in a crash instead of drawing the same amount?
- Probably. And that flexibility is one of the best defences there is. The tool deliberately withdraws the same amount every year to show the danger at its rawest. In real life, trimming your spending in the bad years is exactly how people survive a bad first decade; the full order of operations, buffer first, trims second, is in Living off it, and The Spare Key is where you price that trim in advance and write down when you would decide.
Nothing here is financial, investment, medical or retirement advice: it’s arithmetic and education. The calculators use the numbers you enter, The Exit Rehearsal compares your own Plan and Reality without interpreting either, and The Spare Key prices the fallback you enter without recommending one. Some tools remember work in the browser, some can place a scenario in the page address, and the Rehearsal and the Spare Key stay in this browser unless you print them, download them, or keep them in your account. Each tool tells you what it keeps and where. Decisions about your money are yours, ideally with a licensed adviser. I’m happily not one.
Bring me a challenge.
The Exit Audit, then ninety minutes: a straight verdict, real alternatives with their pros and cons, and your first move. If you want someone to nod along, I’m the wrong person to pay.