About RefinedFI
Built by an MBA who manages more than $1 billion.
I write anonymously because I continue doing this work professionally.
Why this exists
Recently, I sat down with a relative to review their retirement accounts. Smart person, decades of saving, working with a reputable advisor. They had no plan for where the next dollar should go, no plan for a 20% market drop in their second year of retirement, and no way to tell whether their fees bought anything useful.
I see the same thing at work. Clients arrive from reputable firms with broken plans and broken portfolios. Unwinding the damage takes months. Sometimes years.
Refined FI gives you what my relative was missing: a plan, the portfolios that match it, and the Risk Monitor that alerts you when to act. You pay one flat price a year, not a percentage of your savings.
Who writes this
Not consulting. Not on a career break. Not retired. This is the day job.
The families I work for can't afford a catastrophic mistake. Their income has to survive recessions, inflation spikes, rate cycles and policy shocks, in the bad years as well as the average ones.
The same rules I use for those families run every calculator and portfolio on Refined FI.
After I built it I tested it on myself. It told me I could retire 2 years and 8 months sooner, by making small changes.
I've been doing this for over two decades. I thought I had optimized everything.
Why anonymous
Putting my name on Refined FI would mean giving up the day job, along with the institutional tools and data that make this research worth reading.
The tradeoff is anonymity for quality. I think it's worth it.
Tested against the worst years
Most retirement income advice works backward from a rule of thumb. Start with 4%, adjust for comfort, hope it holds. That's a guess wearing a spreadsheet.
An engineer asks one question about a bridge: will it hold in a hurricane?
My background combines engineering and finance. Engineering taught me to build systems that can be tested. Finance taught me how to allocate capital under uncertainty.
So I test retirement plans the same way, against the worst plausible sequence of events rather than average returns. Then I build the income strategy to survive it.
What you'll find here
- Free calculators. Find out how much you need, where your next dollar should go, whether your 401(k) has the right funds, and how long your money may last.
- Portfolios for each stage: saving for retirement, retiring soon, and retired. Every holding has to earn its place.
- The Risk Monitor. Market risk is checked daily and translated into one clear portfolio instruction.
- Research on which account to fund and what to hold in it, written so you can act on it the same day.
How the maps are built
Start with where you are.
Every plan starts with where you are, where you're going, and which risks matter at your stage. Then I pick the portfolio and tools that get you there.
Independent by design.
No affiliate links. No sponsored content. No commissions for recommending a fund or product. My only incentive is building a map that helps you make better decisions.
How to follow the research
Gold+ retirement system
Three years sooner. Five years longer.
Your numbers, my portfolios, and market risk checked for you every day.
Show me my three years →Your first year is guaranteed. Run your numbers in the calculators and follow your path. If Gold+ does not show you at least a year, tell me within 60 days and I will refund you in full.
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