Windfalls are one-time inflows that aren't recurring income - inheritances, proceeds from selling a property, a legal settlement, a lump-sum gift. The Windfalls page lets you add as many of these as you expect, each on its own row, with the year it arrives and the account that receives it.

Enter net amounts

The amount you enter is the net figure - what actually lands in your account after taxes, fees, and selling costs. The engine doesn't apply further tax treatment to windfall deposits. This keeps the model simple and matches how most people think about a windfall ("I'll get $200k after taxes when the house sells"), but it does mean you need to estimate the after-tax amount yourself when entering things that have meaningful tax exposure (e.g. a large brokerage liquidation tied to the sale).

Required fields per windfall

• Description - a short label like "Inheritance" or "Sell rental property." Shows in the year-by-year projection and any timeline / report output.
• Amount - the net dollar value in the units you choose below.
• At Age - the age (you, or in some cases your spouse's age) at which the windfall arrives. The engine uses calendar-year-of-age semantics - "age 70" means the calendar year you turn 70, with the deposit credited on January 1 of that year. The Age dropdown also lists your active Custom and Relocation Events (see Milestones & Events); anchoring a windfall to e.g. "House sold" or "Move to FL" keeps the cash flow in sync if you reschedule the event.

Today's dollars vs Future dollars

The Dollar Type toggle changes how the amount is interpreted:

• Today's - the amount represents what something is worth right now. The engine inflates it forward to the event year using the Annual Inflation rate you specify. Use this when you're thinking in current purchasing power ("inheriting roughly $200k in today's terms").
• Future - the amount is the nominal number you'll actually receive in that future year. No inflation is applied. Use this when you already know the nominal figure ("the bond matures at $50,000 in 2035").

When Today's is selected, the Annual Inflation control appears so you can pick a rate (the plan's general rate, a custom rate, etc.). Future-dollar windfalls don't need an inflation setting because they're already in nominal terms. See How inflation works in the plan for the full explanation.

Deposit to Account

Each windfall is routed to one specific account. The dropdown lists every Taxable Investment account and every Cash account in your plan. Tax-deferred and Tax-free (Roth) accounts are intentionally excluded - they have annual IRS contribution caps and other rules that prevent depositing a lump sum freely. If you want a windfall to land in a tax-advantaged account, route it to a Taxable or Cash account first and then model a separate contribution flow that respects the limits.

If you don't pick a specific account, the default Cash account receives the deposit. For users with multiple Cash accounts and a reserve target configured, the windfall lands first in the chosen account and is then drawn down as usual under the normal withdrawal order. See Where unspent earnings go for the related "surplus income" routing logic, which is mechanically similar.

Common use cases

• Inheritance - enter today's dollars at the expected age, with a sensible inflation rate. If you're modeling a young inheritance with low certainty, treat the amount and timing conservatively.
• Property sale - the net proceeds after closing costs, mortgage payoff, and any capital-gains tax. Use Today's dollars if you're projecting based on the home's current value plus appreciation. Note that if you've set up the property under Real Estate, planned sales there are routed automatically - you only need a Windfall row for sales not modeled via Real Estate.
• Roth IRA backdoor - if you're modeling a year-end lump sum that you intend to push into a Roth, route the windfall to a Cash or Taxable account here and then model the contribution itself on the appropriate page.
• Settlement - whatever flavor of one-time inflow you've got, enter the net amount on the year it arrives.
• An employment bonus is NOT a windfall. A windfall is entered net and the planner applies no tax to it, so a bonus entered here is untaxed and your plan looks better than it is. Bonuses belong on Work & Other Income under Bonuses & Equity Compensation, where they are taxed as wages in the year they are paid, payroll tax included.

What this isn't for

• Recurring income. Wages, rental income, royalties, and other ongoing streams go on Income (Work & Other), not Windfalls.
• Social Security and pensions. Those have their own dedicated pages because of their special rules around taxation, survivor benefits, and claiming ages.
• Required Minimum Distributions. RMDs are generated by the engine when you have Tax-deferred balances past the applicable age - they don't get manually entered.
• Annuity payouts. Use Income (Passive) for periodic annuity payments. Use Windfalls only if the payout is genuinely lump-sum.