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FI Stage Assessment

FI Stage Assessment: Methodology

Understand the approach, what your result can tell you, and where judgment still matters.

Current tool · Version 2.1.0

Capacity, concerns, and a next step

Four dimensions of financial capacity

Day-to-Day Capacity
Ordinary financial life works sustainably, and lasting progress can accumulate.
Shock Capacity
A meaningful foreseeable disruption does not break the financial system or erase lasting progress.
Future Capacity
Your trajectory supports the important future obligations and goals you have chosen.
Work Independence
Your finances support meaningful choices and, ultimately, an ongoing lifestyle without required paid work.

These dimensions are not averaged into a score. A stage describes a financial dependency that has changed—not confidence, ambition, personal worth, or a required balance in the bank.

Behavioral boundaries, not a wealth ladder

Building Stability
Ordinary expenses are not yet covered sustainably, so recurring shortfalls constrain lasting progress.
Stability
Ordinary expenses are sustainably covered, so normal life no longer routinely creates a shortfall and progress can accumulate.
Resilience
Accessible resources and appropriate protection can absorb a meaningful foreseeable disruption without breaking the financial system or erasing progress.
Agency
Financial capacity permits a meaningful voluntary work or life change while preserving the financial foundation and a workable plan for important future commitments.
Core Independence
Sustainable resources that do not require continued work can reasonably support the reality-tested Core Lifestyle across the planning horizon, even if the full Chosen Lifestyle still requires work.
Full Financial Independence
Sustainable resources that do not require continued work can reasonably support the full Chosen Lifestyle across the planning horizon, making paid work financially optional under the planning assumptions.

Building Stability is the foundation; the five stages run from Stability through Full Financial Independence. Progress is not always sequential. You can move in either direction, skip stages, or make meaningful progress within a stage. Months of runway and coverage percentages provide context, not automatic promotion.

Core Lifestyle is the realistic ongoing life you deliberately want protected, including taxes, healthcare, maintenance, replacements, irregular costs, dependents, and commitments. It is not an emergency austerity budget. Chosen Lifestyle is the full life you value—not a list of unnecessary expenses.

Assumptions and information to check

Use one consistent individual or household scope. A work-independent support estimate must account for labor dependence, reliability, liquidity, duration, timing, and concentration. A temporary bridge or an owner-operated business is not automatically sustainable lifestyle support.

Household disagreement remains visible. The lower spending estimate does not automatically win. Missing information is not treated as zero capacity, and unresolved assumptions or conflicting dimensions can make a result provisional.

The assessment asks for evidence-based judgments. It does not independently calculate a sustainable withdrawal rate, verify account statements, or guarantee that resources will last. Sustainability means a reasonable plan across the planning horizon under defensible assumptions.

Changelog

A brief public record of what changed. Calculation details and security-sensitive implementation information are intentionally excluded.

View version history
  1. Version 2.1.0 Checks each selected work or life choice separately, clarifies the questions, and checks whether partner guidance is relevant.
  2. Version 2.0.5 Corrected the published Quest name to Navigate Money Together while preserving saved guidance.
  3. Version 2.0.4 Made revision and restart visible, with individual answer editing and confirmed restart.
  4. Version 2.0.3 Combined and simplified the suggested Quest and MOMENTUM handoff.
  5. Version 2.0.2 Placed question progress below the header and removed the overview detour.
  6. Version 2.0.1 Explained the four dimensions with a four-panel view of your saved findings.
  7. Version 2.0.0 Rebuilt the assessment around behavioral stage boundaries, four capacity dimensions, and evidence-led next steps.
  8. Version 1.2.9 Corrected the published Quest name to Navigate Money Together while preserving saved guidance.
  9. Version 1.2.8 Combined result history and saved assessments with draft rows and direct history navigation.
  10. Version 1.2.7 Added a saved-stage map with separate runway and sustainable lifestyle-coverage indicators in results and PDFs.
  11. Version 1.2.6 Simplified update notices and grouped assessment and saved-answer actions below the guidance.
  12. Version 1.2.5 Standardized result actions and added community discussion cards beside relevant findings.
  13. Version 1.2.4 Explained the meaning of your stage beside the saved answers supporting it in results and PDFs.
  14. Version 1.2.3 Kept background save feedback from shifting the form while you answer.
  15. Version 1.2.2 Centered the mobile menu control and kept the Toolkit name visible when space allows.
  16. Version 1.2.1 Added clearer navigation, version history, and more useful contextual guidance.
  17. Version 1.2.0 Improved clarification recovery and protected completed results from stale requests.
  18. Version 1.1.6 Clarified and repositioned the public Methodology page.
  19. Version 1.1.5 Added a public explanation of the tool approach and limitations.
  20. Version 1.1.4 Added account preferences and notices when an updated assessment is available.
  21. Version 1.1.3 Added accessible history actions and member-local time displays.
  22. Version 1.1.2 Improved result history, summaries, and duplicate-run grouping.
  23. Version 1.1.1 Added shared guided progress and Quick Guides.
  24. Version 1.1.0 Improved risk-sensitive Quest guidance while preserving stage definitions.
  25. Version 1.0.1 Improved sign-in guidance and report headers.
  26. Version 1.0.0 Established the first public FI Stage Assessment release.

A result you can revisit

This page describes the current tool. An older saved result may use an earlier approach; its saved version and conclusions remain unchanged. Reviewing your answers and completing an updated run creates a new result without rewriting the earlier one.

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