What is a good probability of success?

What a retirement probability of success actually measures, why 95% is not automatically better than 85%, and how to read the number without treating it as a grade.

What the number is

Probability of success is the share of modelled market paths in which the portfolio never hits zero before the horizon, under a stated spending rule and a stated engine. It is not a grade, a forecast or a chance of dying broke. It is a statement about a model.

What is a good number?

Most planners treat 85% to 95% as a reasonable band. Below ~80% the plan is asking the market to be kind. Above ~97% you are usually buying certainty the model cannot actually sell — extra years of work, or spending you deferred and never took — because the assumptions (fees, taxes, spending flexibility, the regime model itself) are not known to that precision.

The ruin rate is one minus success. The methodology page is how Killion computes it. Does Monte Carlo overstate success is why a 92% from one engine is not a 92% from another.

How to use it

Compare two plans on the same engine, the same seed and the same household. A jump from 78% to 91% after a 10% spending cut is information. A lone 91% on a slide is a slogan.

Frequently asked questions

What is a good probability of success for retirement?
Most planners treat 85% to 95% as a reasonable band. Chasing 99% usually costs years of extra work or spending you deferred and never took, and the extra precision is not real given the model assumptions.
Does 90% success mean a 10% chance of dying broke?
No. It means 10% of the modelled market paths depleted the portfolio before the horizon, under those assumptions, with no mid-course change. Real households cut spending, work longer or change the mix.