“We're 61 with $1.4M. Can we retire now?”

This is the most common version of the question, and it's the one free calculators answer worst — because the honest answer depends almost entirely on things they don't model.

The straight-line answer

$1.4M, spending $90,000 a year, 6% return. Punch that into almost any free calculator and it draws a line: the money grows at 6%, you take out $90k, and it lasts past 95. You're fine. Retire.

That answer is wrong, and it's wrong in a direction that costs you years.

Why it's wrong: nobody spends $90,000

You spend $90,000. You withdraw considerably more, because the IRS takes its cut on the way out. If most of that $1.4M sits in a traditional IRA or 401(k), every dollar you pull is ordinary income. To put $90,000 in your pocket you might pull $105,000 — and that extra $15,000 comes out of the same portfolio, every year, compounding against you.

A straight-line calculator that ignores tax isn't off by a rounding error. It's solving a different problem.

Why it's wrong again: an average 6% is not a 6%

A fixed 6% and an average 6% produce very different retirements. If your first three years are bad, you sell more shares at lower prices to fund the same spending, and the portfolio never fully recovers — even if the average over thirty years comes out to exactly 6%. That's sequence risk, and it's why a plan that "works" on a straight line can fail in half of real market paths.

The questions that actually decide it

For a 61-year-old with $1.4M, the answer turns on things the calculator never asked:

• What's the split? $1.4M all in a traditional IRA is a very different retirement than $1.4M across pre-tax, taxable, and Roth. The second one gives you control over your own bracket.
• When are you claiming Social Security? Claiming at 62 versus 70 changes both the income and the tax on it — and the gap years before you claim are the cheapest conversion window you'll ever have.
• What happens at 75? RMDs force money out whether you need it or not. A $1.4M IRA that grows to $2M by 75 forces roughly $80k/year out at the government's schedule.