Adding Income Streams to Your Plan

If you started reading Create a New Plan and want to go into deeper detail on adding income, you’re in the right place. This article walks through all the steps and covers three types of income: a salary, a side hustle, and an inheritance.

Income is the second stage of creating a plan, after adding Milestones. You can also add income after creating your plan by scrolling below the graph to the Income section, located between Accounts and Expenses.

Adding a Salary

Click + Add Income and choose Salary. To see all available options, expand each section by clicking the up/down arrows.

• Starting Amount - enter $55,000 and click the three-dot menu to choose Actual Currency or Today’s Currency
• Frequency - defaults to Yearly; you can also switch to once per year, quarterly, monthly, and more
• Time Range - choose a Start date (for example, Before Current Year) and an End date (for example, Retirement)
• Change Over Time - defaults to Match Inflation; other options include Increase by a set percent, Decrease by a set percent, Increase by Inflation + %, Decrease by Inflation + %, or a non-linear advanced schedule

Tax Handling

• Type - how this income is categorized for tax purposes: Auto, Wage, Self-Employment, Ordinary, Dividend, or Capital Gains
• Withholding - withhold some for taxes to fine-tune cash flow timing: Auto, Fixed Rate, or None
• Tax-Exempt - toggle on if this income is exempt from taxes in specific jurisdictions; if toggled on, choose the applicable jurisdiction

More Options

• Part-Time Work - toggle on to model a period of reduced income before fully retiring; set a Part-Time Start, Part-Time End, and Income Percentage relative to your full salary
• Defined Benefit Pension - see the Defined Benefit Pensions article for details

Advanced Options

• Send To - by default, income follows the standard cash flow rules set in your Flows section; switch to a Specific Account to redirect it
• Recurrence - toggle Repeat on to create a pattern of similar events at regular intervals; once enabled, set:
  • Years Between - number of years between each recurrence
  • Scaling - adjust the amount up or down with each recurrence, on top of any inflation adjustments
  • Until - when to stop creating new instances; attach to a Milestone (such as Retirement or Life Expectancy) or a specific month and year

Click Add and your salary is added to your plan.

Adding a Side Hustle

Click + Add Income and choose Side Hustle. To see all available options, expand each section by clicking the up/down arrows.

• Starting Amount - enter $2,500 and click the three-dot menu to choose Actual Currency or Today’s Currency
• Frequency - Quarterly is often a better fit for irregular income that doesn’t follow a monthly schedule
• Time Range - choose a Start date (for example, Before Current Year) and an End date (for example, Retirement)
• Change Over Time - defaults to Match Inflation; other options include Increase by a set percent, Decrease by a set percent, Increase by Inflation + %, Decrease by Inflation + %, or a non-linear advanced schedule

Tax Handling

• Type - defaults to Self-Employment for side hustles; other options include Auto, Wage, Ordinary, Dividend, or Capital Gains
• Withholding - withhold some for taxes to fine-tune cash flow timing: Auto, Fixed Rate, or None
• Tax-Exempt - toggle on if this income is exempt from taxes in specific jurisdictions; if toggled on, choose the applicable jurisdiction

More Options

• Part-Time Work - toggle on to model a period of reduced income; set a Part-Time Start, Part-Time End, and Income Percentage relative to your full side hustle earnings
• Defined Benefit Pension - see the Defined Benefit Pensions article for details

Advanced Options

• Send To - by default, income follows the standard cash flow rules set in your Flows section; switch to a Specific Account to redirect it
• Recurrence - toggle Repeat on to create a pattern of similar events at regular intervals; once enabled, set:
  • Years Between - number of years between each recurrence
  • Scaling - adjust the amount up or down with each recurrence, on top of any inflation adjustments
  • Until - when to stop creating new instances; attach to a Milestone or a specific month and year

Click Add and your side hustle is added to your plan.

Adding an Inheritance

Inheritance works differently from other income types because it assumes you won’t receive inherited funds on a regular basis.

Click + Add Income and choose Inheritance. To see all available options, expand each section by clicking the up/down arrows.

• Amount - enter $50,000 and click the three-dot menu to choose Actual Currency or Today’s Currency
• Frequency - defaults to Once
• Timing - set to Now or an expected month and year in the future

Tax Handling

• Type - how this income is categorized for tax purposes: Auto, Wage, Self-Employment, Ordinary, Dividend, or Capital Gains
• Withholding - withhold some for taxes to fine-tune cash flow timing: Auto, Fixed Rate, or None
• Tax-Exempt - toggle on if this income is exempt from taxes in specific jurisdictions; if toggled on, choose the applicable jurisdiction

Recurrence - toggle on to create a pattern of similar events at regular intervals.

Advanced Options - toggle on to reveal a Send To option:

• Automatic - income follows standard cash flow rules and is available for expenses or other flows
• Specific Account - send the inheritance directly to a specific account

Click Add and your inheritance is added to your plan.

In addition to these three types, ProjectionLab supports many other income types including Custom Income. Explore the full list by clicking + Add Income from your plan.