Net Worth Calculator
Add up your assets and liabilities to see total net worth, percentage breakdown, and how you compare to US age-based medians.
Assets
Liabilities
Net Worth
| Category | Item | Amount | % of side |
|---|---|---|---|
| Asset | Cash & checking | $5,000 | 2.5% |
| Asset | Savings & HYSA | $15,000 | 7.5% |
| Asset | 401(k) / IRA | $50,000 | 25.0% |
| Asset | Brokerage / stocks | $10,000 | 5.0% |
| Asset | Home equity | $100,000 | 50.0% |
| Asset | Vehicles | $20,000 | 10.0% |
| Liability | Mortgage | $200,000 | 80.6% |
| Liability | Auto loan | $15,000 | 6.0% |
| Liability | Student loans | $30,000 | 12.1% |
| Liability | Credit cards | $3,000 | 1.2% |
| Age band | Median net worth | Your gap |
|---|---|---|
| Under 35 | $22,000 | -$70,000 |
| 35–44 | $135,000 | -$183,000 |
| 45–54 | $250,000 | -$298,000 |
| 55–64 | $330,000 | -$378,000 |
| 65+ | $320,000 | -$368,000 |
What net worth measures (and what it misses)
Net worth is the simplest one-number summary of your financial position: total assets minus total liabilities. A positive number means you own more than you owe; a negative number means the opposite. It captures wealth at a single point in time, not income, not cash flow, not lifestyle.
What net worth does well: it forces you to look at the whole balance sheet at once, it's comparable across people and across years, and it rewards both saving more and paying down debt. A high earner who spends every dollar can have a tiny net worth; a frugal middle-class saver can have a large one. Net worth is the scoreboard for the game most people are actually playing without knowing it.
What net worth misses: liquidity (a $400K paid-off house and $400K in an index fund are very different), volatility (crypto and home prices can swing 30% in a year), human capital(a 28-year-old doctor with $250K in student loans has −$200K net worth and a multi-million-dollar career ahead), and quality of debt(a 3% mortgage is not the same as a 24% credit card balance). Use net worth as your headline metric, but don't mistake it for the whole picture.
Common assets to count
- Cash and checking: balances in checking accounts, money market funds, physical cash. The most liquid possible asset.
- Savings and HYSA: high-yield savings, CDs, treasury bills. Liquid but earning some yield.
- Retirement accounts: 401(k), 403(b), Traditional and Roth IRAs, HSA, pensions with a known cash value. Count pre-tax balances at face value — most people gloss over the future tax bill, which is fine for tracking but matters for retirement planning.
- Brokerage and stocks: taxable brokerage accounts, individual stocks, ETFs, mutual funds, employer stock (RSUs that have vested), index funds.
- Real estate equity: market value of your home minus mortgage balance. For investment properties, value minus loan balance. Use Zillow/Redfin/Realtor estimates as a starting point but discount 5–10% for selling costs.
- Vehicles: cars, trucks, motorcycles, boats. Use Kelley Blue Book or Edmunds private-party value, not what you paid. Vehicles depreciate fast — most lose 50%+ in five years.
- Other: collectibles, jewelry, art, crypto, private business equity, cash value of permanent life insurance. Be conservative on illiquid stuff — if you can't turn it into cash quickly, it's worth less than the “asking price” you'd list it for.
Common liabilities
- Mortgage: principal balance remaining (not the original loan amount). For most homeowners, this is the largest single liability and the largest single asset (the home) sits on the other side of the balance sheet.
- Student loans: federal and private. Count the principal balance, not the original amount borrowed. Even loans on income-driven repayment count — IDR is a payment schedule, not forgiveness.
- Credit cards: current statement balance. If you pay in full each month and the statement shows $0 carryover, it doesn't belong on your balance sheet (or if you want to be precise, count the current swipes that haven't been billed yet).
- Auto loans: principal balance. Many borrowers are “underwater” — the loan balance is larger than the car's value — especially in years 1–2 of a loan with low down payment.
- Personal loans, HELOCs, BNPL: principal balances. Buy-now-pay-later is real debt, even if the user-experience hides that.
- Tax debt and money owed to family: count it. Hidden liabilities create false confidence.
How net worth changes over a lifetime
The typical US net-worth curve is roughly U-shaped on the way up, then flattens or falls in retirement:
- Early 20s: often negative or near zero. Student loans, low savings, no equity yet.
- Late 20s to mid 30s: slow climb. Income rises, retirement contributions start compounding, first home purchase adds equity but also adds the mortgage.
- Late 30s to 40s: acceleration. Salary peaks for many careers, mortgage paydown starts moving real principal, retirement balance compounds on a meaningful base.
- 50s to early 60s: steepest growth. Catch-up contributions, kids out of the house, mortgage shrinking, peak earning years.
- Retirement (65+): usually flat or declining. Drawdowns from retirement accounts replace earned income. Net worth doesn't need to keep growing — it needs to last.
The shape is not destiny. People who start late, get divorced, deal with major medical bills, or buy in expensive cities have flatter or more volatile curves. People who marry dual-income with low expenses, inherit, or work in high-comp tech can blow past these benchmarks by 30+. The benchmark is a reference, not a goal.
Net worth benchmarks by age
US Federal Reserve Survey of Consumer Finances (most recent vintages) median household net worth by head-of-household age:
- Under 35: ~$22,000
- 35–44: ~$135,000
- 45–54: ~$250,000
- 55–64: ~$330,000
- 65+: ~$320,000
A few caveats worth keeping in mind. Means (averages) are several times higher because of extreme skew at the top — Elon Musk being in the same sample as a college graduate distorts the average but barely moves the median. Use the median. These are household figures, not individual — a married couple is one household. They include home equity, which dominates the balance sheet for most middle-aged households. And they vary enormously by income: top-decile households at every age have 10–50× the median.
A commonly cited shortcut is the income-multiple rule: roughly 1× salary by age 30, 2× by 35, 3–4× by 40, 5–6× by 50, 8× by 60, 10× by retirement. It adjusts for income (higher earners need more saved to maintain lifestyle in retirement) and gives a more personal target than a flat dollar figure. See the401(k) Calculator to project whether your retirement savings are on pace.
Track it monthly or quarterly
The single most underrated personal-finance habit is consistent net-worth tracking. Reasons:
- It catches problems early. Lifestyle creep and slow debt growth are easy to ignore in any single month — three years of stagnant net worth is impossible to ignore.
- It shows what's working. The line that starts climbing visibly when you up your 401(k) contribution is more motivating than any abstract advice.
- It reframes market drops. A 30% market drop on a $50K portfolio is a $15K paper loss; on a $500K portfolio it's a $150K paper loss. Watching the curve through past drawdowns trains the calm needed for the next one.
- It compounds the saving habit. Once tracking is in place, every spending decision is implicitly weighed against “how much would this hurt the line?”
Pick a cadence (first of the month is the simplest), use the same accounts and valuation methods each time, and don't panic about month-to-month noise. The trend over 12+ months is the signal. Pair this with theInvestment Calculator to project where the trend line is headed if you keep your current contribution rate, and theMortgage Calculator to see how amortization steadily moves principal from the liability side to the asset side over the life of the loan.