Emergency Fund Calculator

This page opens the savings goal calculator in monthly-deposit mode for the most fundamental goal in personal finance: the emergency fund. The standard advice is to hold three to six months of essential expenses — rent, food, utilities, insurance, minimum debt payments — in cash you can reach within a day or two. Add up one month of those essentials, multiply by three for a starter cushion or six for solid coverage, and enter that as your goal.

Then choose a realistic horizon and let the calculator do the annuity math: it accounts for what you have saved already and for the interest a savings account pays, assuming monthly compounding and end-of-month deposits. A 6,000 fund built over two years at 4% needs about 240 a month; the same fund in one year needs roughly double, since interest contributes little on short horizons — the deposits do the heavy lifting.

Two practical rules make the plan stick. Keep the fund in a separate high-yield savings account, not in your checking account and not in investments that can be down exactly when you need them. And automate the deposit for payday, so the fund builds before spending decisions happen. When a real emergency drains part of it, come back and recompute the monthly amount to refill it.