Net Worth by Age Calculator
Your age, and the whole balance sheet
Your result will appear here
Fill in the fields on the left and this updates as you type.
Know what this estimate is based on
- Jurisdiction
- General mathematical model
- Scope and limitations
- Planning estimate only. Enter complete, current figures and keep an appropriate buffer for irregular or unexpected expenses.
- Source links checked
- Jul 30, 2026
Built and regression-tested by Smart Tools Lab. It has not been individually reviewed by a licensed financial, tax, or legal professional.
How to use
- 01
Enter the age of the household head. That single number picks which of the Survey of Consumer Finances' six age bands you are measured against — under 35, 35 to 44, 45 to 54, 55 to 64, 65 to 74, or 75 and older.
- 02
Enter the assets the survey counts: cash and savings, retirement and brokerage accounts, the house at market value, and vehicles and business equity under other assets.
- 03
Enter the debts — the mortgage, then student loans, car loans and card balances in the other-debt field.
- 04
Read the headline: how far above or below the median for your band you sit, with your multiple of that median beside it. Then read the mean in the stat next to it and note how much higher it is.
- 05
Open the table for all six bands, both statistics and the ratio between them. If you are reading this after the 2025 survey lands, every benchmark figure is an editable field in the advanced panel.
Formula
Net worth = cash + retirement and brokerage accounts + home at market value + other assets − mortgage − other debt. Age picks one of six published bands, each carrying a median and a mean from the 2022 Survey of Consumer Finances. The headline is your net worth minus that band's median; the multiple is your net worth divided by it. The all-families median of $192,900 is used as a genuine 50th-percentile threshold. No percentile is interpolated anywhere, because the survey publishes band figures rather than a percentile lookup.
Example
A 42-year-old household with $21,000 of cash, $168,000 in retirement and brokerage accounts, a $415,000 house and $31,000 of other assets, against a $251,000 mortgage and $38,000 of other debt: $635,000 of assets less $289,000 of debt is $346,000 of net worth. Age 42 lands in the 35-to-44 band, whose 2022 median is $135,600 — so this household is $210,400 ahead of it, at 2.55 times the median. The mean for the same band is $549,600, which is 4.1 times the median and a figure most households in the band never reach; being below it is unremarkable. Against the all-families median of $192,900 the household is in the upper half of the whole country. The next band up, 45 to 54, has a median of $247,200 — $111,600 higher, which is what a decade looks like at the population level.
Definitions
- Median
- The middle household — half are above it, half below. The right yardstick for "is this normal" because no single fortune can move it.
- Mean
- The arithmetic average. In wealth data it runs three to five times the median at every age, because a handful of very large balance sheets sit inside it.
- Survey of Consumer Finances
- The Federal Reserve's triennial household balance-sheet survey. The 2022 edition is the most recent published; the 2025 edition is due late in 2026.
- Age band
- The survey's six brackets for the age of the household head. It publishes a point estimate per band and nothing in between, so nothing here is interpolated.
- 2022 dollars
- The survey states its figures at 2022 prices and does not restate them. Comparing a current balance sheet against them flatters you by whatever inflation has done since.
Good to know
Why the average is the wrong number
Every headline about American wealth quotes a mean, and every one of them describes a household that essentially does not exist. In the Federal Reserve's 2022 Survey of Consumer Finances, households headed by someone 35 to 44 had a median net worth of $135,600 and a mean of $549,600. The mean is 4.1 times the median, and the ratio holds across every age band: 4.7× under 35, 3.9× at 45 to 54, 4.3× at 55 to 64, 4.4× at 65 to 74, 4.8× at 75 and over. That is not measurement noise. It is the arithmetic consequence of a distribution with a very long right tail: a single household worth two hundred million lifts the average of a thousand households by two hundred thousand and lifts the median by nothing at all. The median is the household in the middle — half above, half below — and it is the only one of the two figures that answers the question people are actually asking, which is whether their own number is normal. Anyone quoting an average net worth to you is, without necessarily meaning to, quoting the tail.
What the survey counts, and the two things it leaves out
The Survey of Consumer Finances measures a balance sheet the way an accountant would: assets at market value less every liability. That includes the primary residence, vehicles, retirement and brokerage accounts, business equity and cash, against the mortgage, student loans, car loans and card balances. Two of the largest assets many American households own are excluded, and knowing which ones changes how you read your standing. A defined-benefit pension not yet in payment does not appear, so a public-sector worker with thirty years of service and a guaranteed income for life can show a modest net worth and be more secure than a private-sector household showing three times as much. Future Social Security does not appear either, which understates the position of essentially every household near retirement. Neither omission is an error — a promise of future income is genuinely not a balance-sheet asset — but it means the comparison is a measure of accumulated capital rather than of retirement readiness. Read it as context. It is not a score, and it is certainly not a plan.
The vintage problem, and why every figure here is editable
The most recent published Survey of Consumer Finances describes 2022 and states its figures in 2022 dollars. It was published in October 2023. The survey runs every three years, the 2025 edition was fielded from March to December 2025, and the Federal Reserve has said summary results arrive late in 2026 — so the numbers on this page are the freshest that exist and are also several years old, and both statements are true at once. Two things follow. First, prices have risen since 2022 and the survey does not restate its dollars, so comparing a current balance sheet against a 2022 median flatters you by whatever inflation has done in between; a household that has exactly kept pace with prices will appear to have gained ground. Second, this is precisely why all thirteen benchmark figures on this page are editable fields in the advanced panel rather than constants buried in code. When the 2025 survey lands, correcting the two rows that concern you takes a moment and does not require anyone to redeploy a website.
What a percentile would take, and why this page does not print one
The obvious next question after "am I above the median" is "what percentile am I in", and the honest answer is that the published survey does not support one. Table 2 of the Bulletin contains two panels that are routinely confused. One reports median and mean net worth by percentile of usual INCOME, in quintile bands. The other reports median and mean net worth by percentile of NET WORTH, in quartile bands — under 25, 25 to 49.9, 50 to 74.9, 75 to 89.9, 90 to 100. The tell is the band width, and mixing the two up is a live error that circulates widely. Even reading the second panel correctly, what it publishes is the MEDIAN of each band, not that band's threshold: the figure $356,300 is the middle of the 50th-to-75th group, not the line you cross to enter it. Interpolating a percentile from band medians would produce an authoritative-looking number the Federal Reserve never published, so this page does not. What it uses instead is the one genuine threshold in the release: the all-families median of $192,900, which by definition separates the lower half of US families from the upper half.
Frequently asked questions
Why does this lead with the median and not the average?
Because the average is not describing anyone. For households headed by someone 35 to 44, the 2022 median net worth is $135,600 and the mean is $549,600 — the mean is 4.1 times the median, and the ratio is between 3.9 and 4.8 in every single age band. That gap is the shape of American wealth: a small number of very large fortunes pull the average far above the household in the middle. A median is the household in the middle. It is the only one of the two figures that answers "is this normal".
What percentile am I in?
This page will not tell you, and that is deliberate. The Survey of Consumer Finances publishes a median and a mean for each age band, and separately the median of each net-worth quartile — a band's median is not that band's threshold, so mapping the two together and interpolating would invent a percentile the Federal Reserve does not publish. The one genuine threshold in the release is the all-families median of $192,900: half of US families sit below it and half above, so clearing it puts you in the upper half of the country regardless of age.
How old is this data?
The figures are the 2022 survey, expressed in 2022 dollars, published in October 2023. The survey runs every three years; the 2025 edition was fielded through December 2025 and the Federal Reserve has said summary results arrive late in 2026. Two consequences follow. Prices have risen since 2022, so comparing a current balance sheet against a 2022 median flatters you slightly. And when the new survey lands, all thirteen benchmark figures on this page are editable fields you can correct in place.
What counts as net worth in the survey?
Assets at market value — the primary residence, vehicles, retirement accounts, brokerage accounts, business equity, cash — less every debt. Two of the largest assets many households own are excluded: a defined-benefit pension not yet in payment, and future Social Security. A public-sector worker with a pension can look poor on this measure and be entirely secure, which is one good reason to read the comparison as context rather than as a score.
The bands are ten years wide. Does that matter?
It does, and it is the main reason to hold a standing lightly. The youngest household in a band is compared against one nearly ten years further along in both saving and markets, and a decade of compounding is most of the difference between the bottom and the top of any band. Where you sit inside your own band matters as much as the band figure does — which is why the next band's median is worth watching as a trajectory rather than the current one as a verdict.
Why does the median fall after 75?
Because the 75-and-older band has spent down. The median peaks at $409,900 for households headed by someone 65 to 74 and falls to $335,600 after 75 — retirement spending, healthcare, and gifts to children all draw the balance sheet down, and a stock measured across a lifetime is expected to fall in the decades you are living off it. A declining figure in the last band is the plan working, not the plan failing.
How is this different from the savings milestone page?
Different input, different yardstick, different source. This page takes a whole balance sheet — the house, the cash, the debts — and compares it against a Federal Reserve population statistic. The savings milestone page takes one retirement balance and compares it against a provider's salary multiple, which nobody surveyed and which has no data year at all. A household can clear one comfortably and miss the other, and neither result contradicts the other.