Retirement Healthcare Cost Estimator

This calculator estimates the lifetime healthcare and aged care costs you might face in retirement in New Zealand, an often-overlooked but significant part of planning for later life. While the public health system covers a great deal, retirees still pay plenty out of their own pockets, for GP visits, prescriptions, dental, optical, hearing aids, physiotherapy and the many smaller costs that mount up, and these tend to grow as health needs increase with age. On top of everyday medical costs sits the possibility of aged residential care, which is expensive but income and asset tested, so a government subsidy may cover much of it depending on your means, while those above the threshold pay a capped contribution themselves. You enter your estimated yearly healthcare cost now, the number of years you expect to be in retirement, an inflation rate for medical costs, and an estimate of any aged care costs by years and annual cost, and the calculator totals a realistic lifetime figure, growing the yearly healthcare cost with inflation rather than simply multiplying. Use it to factor healthcare into your retirement savings target, since it is easy to plan for living costs and forget that health is one of the larger and least predictable expenses of a long retirement. This is an estimate and general information, not financial or medical advice.

Healthcare grows with medical inflation each year. Aged care is income and asset tested, so a subsidy may apply. An estimate only, not financial or medical advice.