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The basics
Enter each adult’s age, retirement timing, and lifespan, then assign income and accounts to their owners. A couple’s forecast continues to the later of their two modeled lifetimes.
The first death changes the household inside that forecast. It can end income, transfer accounts, change benefits, and narrow the tax brackets used in later years.
Illustrative numbers
Check the income after the first death
Modeled Social Security benefits before death$30,000 and $20,000 a year
Simplified survivor resultThe larger benefit continues
Separate pensionContinues only according to its survivor setting
Do not assume both Social Security checks continue or that every pension stops entirely. Review the first survivor year and the years after it.
Calculation transparency
How it works in MoneyWhatIf
- 01
An owner’s income ends according to its dates and lifespan, with eligible survivor-income elections handled separately. Social Security keeps its own survivor rule.
- 02
The death year can retain joint filing. Later years use the survivor’s filing treatment; qualifying dependent children can preserve joint-width income-tax brackets for a limited additional window.
- 03
Retirement-account ownership rolls to the surviving spouse for the model’s withdrawal ages and required distributions. Taxable-account and property basis changes follow ownership and the modeled death step-up rules.
- 04
Medicare and care costs end for the person who has died. Income changes can affect IRMAA later through its lookback. Review spending-card dates and amounts to express your intended survivor budget.
Keep in mind
Model limits
Lifespans are scenario inputs, not mortality predictions.
Spousal rollover and basis assumptions simplify inheritance. Trusts, beneficiary disputes, successor-beneficiary rules, and estate administration require information outside this projection.
This explanation documents the planning model. It is educational, not individualized tax, legal, Medicare, or investment advice.
Where it appears
Where to use it
See this concept in context, with a guide to each page and its controls.
The words behind it
Related financial terms
Plain-English definitions, with 2026 figures and worked examples, from the financial terms glossary.