9 Vital Personal Financial Planning Tools
Stay on a wise fiscal course with these tools.
General
• Bankrate offers resources, tools and information on just about every personal finance topic, including calculators for retirement planning, mortgages, insurance and more, and it offers several mobile apps.
• Mint.com is a free online personal finance tool that’s available as a free app for iPad, iPhone and Android devices. Once your personal financial plan is in place, use Mint to stay on course by tracking and managing all of your checking, credit, savings, debt and investment accounts in one place.
• LearnVest.com was initially launched to help women learn about financial management. Now targeting men and women, LearnVest offers advice (connecting you, for a monthly fee, with a certified financial planner), resources and financial plans to fit a variety of budgets.
Home-Buying
• Zillow.com offers a wide range of real estate tools, including current mortgage rates, a mortgage calculator and the ability to search for homes for sale based on a wide range of criteria. Zillow also has free apps for iPhone, Android and Windows smartphones as well as the iPad.
College Savings
• U.S. News & World Report Net Price Calculator (on USNews.com) calculates the total price of an education at the college of your (kid’s) choice.
• SavingForCollege.com is a comprehensive website that includes tools and resources related to 529 plans, scholarships and financial aid programs as well as a college cost calculator and rankings of the best-performing 529 plans.
Retirement Planning
• AARP Retirement Calculator easily steps you through calculations. Go to the work and retirement page at AARP.org and look in the “Tools” section.
• The Flexible Retirement Planner is a free program that’s more sophisticated than the AARP calculator. It lets you simulate a range of “what-if” scenarios to see how different events would affect your lifestyle in retirement. Find it at FlexibleRetirementPlanner.com.
Insurance
• The Life Foundation (you can access its calculators channel at LifeHappens.org) is a nonprofit helping consumers make smart choices with information about life, health, disability and long-term care insurance as well as several calculators to determine insurance needs and resources for finding an agent.