Is the projection in the Renteninformation realistic?

It extrapolates the average of your contributions over the last five years and shows sample future increases of 1 and 2 percent. If your recent years are unrepresentative, say through parental leave, a sabbatical or a recent raise, the projection inherits that distortion. Treat it as a base case built from your recent past, not a promise.

What about the headlines on the 48 percent pension level?

That figure describes a statistical standard pensioner with 45 average-earner years, compared to the current average wage. It is a policy indicator, not your replacement rate. Your own number can sit far above or below it, which is why reading your letter beats reading the news.

I studied for years and worked abroad. Do those gaps hurt?

They show up as missing months. Some gaps count toward certain waiting periods without adding money: school and university after 17 count, within limits, toward the 35-year period, though not the five-year minimum. Foreign periods may count via EU rules or agreements. The fix is more procedural than feared: request an account clarification and get the record corrected while documents are easy to find.

Does my ETF portfolio count as pension?

It counts as capital that must be converted into monthly income by some withdrawal plan, which means explicit assumptions about returns, inflation and how long retirement lasts. Any tool that turns a depot into a monthly figure is making those assumptions; the only question is whether it shows them to you. Insist on seeing them.

Is what you earn and own today enough to retire on in Germany?

Nobody can answer this with a rule of thumb, but almost everyone can answer it with four numbers they already have: the pension earned so far, current spending, the gap between the two, and the years savings would need to cover that gap.

Nobody can answer this question with a rule of thumb, but almost everyone can answer it with four numbers they already have or can request: the pension you have earned so far, your current spending, the gap between the two, and the years your savings would need to cover that gap. This article shows how to assemble the answer for your own household, and why the popular shortcuts mislead in Germany specifically.

This article is information, not financial or legal advice. It describes how to assess your own situation; it does not recommend products or targets.

Start with the letter you probably filed away

Once you have five years of contributions and are 27, Deutsche Rentenversicherung sends you an annual Renteninformation (Section 109 SGB VI). It contains the three headline official numbers about your future pension: what you would get today if you could no longer work, what you would get at standard retirement age if you never paid another cent, and a projection if you keep contributing as you do now. Use the middle number as your floor and the projection as your base case. If you cannot find the letter, you can request your record online. Couples: you need both letters, because the household retires, not a person.

Three deductions the letter does not make for you

The projection in the letter is a gross figure in today's system. Before comparing it to your spending, three adjustments matter in Germany. First, health and long-term care insurance: pensioners pay contributions on their statutory pension, which takes roughly 12 percent off the gross (Section 237 SGB V). Second, tax: German pensions are increasingly taxable; for someone retiring in 2026, 84 percent of the pension is subject to income tax, and the share rises for each later cohort until it reaches 100 percent for those retiring in 2058 (Section 22 EStG). Whether tax is actually due depends on your total retirement income. Third, inflation: over twenty years even 2 percent inflation takes roughly a third of the purchasing power. Any serious look at whether it is enough must be in real, after-deduction terms.

Spending in retirement: measured, not guessed

The common shortcut says you need 80 percent of your last net income. For German households this number is often wrong in both directions at once: housing costs can fall sharply if the mortgage ends before retirement, while health costs and, for some, private care provision rise. The better method is boring: take your actual current spending, remove what provably ends (mortgage payments with a known end date, child costs, work commuting, the saving itself), add what predictably starts, and treat the rest as continuing. You now have a monthly figure in today's euros to hold against the adjusted pension figure.

The gap, and what fills it

Pension minus spending gives you either a surplus or a coverage gap. A gap is not a verdict; it is a design parameter. It can be filled by capital (roughly, the annual gap times the number of retirement years, adjusted for investment returns during retirement), by occupational pensions, by rental income, by working a year longer (which shrinks the gap from both sides: more points, fewer years to fund), or by lower spending. Each lever has a different cost and a different risk, and the honest comparison is only visible when they are all in one projection.

Why this needs a simulation, not a calculator

Every number above interacts with the others: retiring a year later changes the pension, the tax, the insurance contributions and the years to fund, simultaneously, for two people. A single-purpose pension calculator freezes all but one variable, which is precisely how households end up confidently wrong. Miravel holds your whole household in one model, projects it over decades, shows the coverage gap and the decision points, and labels every assumption it uses, including the genuinely uncertain ones like investment returns. Same inputs, same numbers, every run; where something is an estimate, it says so.

Sources

Section 109 SGB VI (annual pension information): gesetze-im-internet.de/sgb_6
Deutsche Rentenversicherung, understanding your Renteninformation: deutsche-rentenversicherung.de
Section 22 EStG (pension taxation schedule under the Wachstumschancengesetz): gesetze-im-internet.de/estg
Section 237 SGB V (pensioners' health insurance contributions): gesetze-im-internet.de/sgb_5
Statistisches Bundesamt, household income and spending survey: destatis.de

Frequently asked questions

Is the projection in the Renteninformation realistic?: It extrapolates the average of your contributions over the last five years and shows sample future increases of 1 and 2 percent. If your recent years are unrepresentative, say through parental leave, a sabbatical or a recent raise, the projection inherits that distortion. Treat it as a base case built from your recent past, not a promise.
What about the headlines on the 48 percent pension level?: That figure describes a statistical standard pensioner with 45 average-earner years, compared to the current average wage. It is a policy indicator, not your replacement rate. Your own number can sit far above or below it, which is why reading your letter beats reading the news.
I studied for years and worked abroad. Do those gaps hurt?: They show up as missing months. Some gaps count toward certain waiting periods without adding money: school and university after 17 count, within limits, toward the 35-year period, though not the five-year minimum. Foreign periods may count via EU rules or agreements. The fix is more procedural than feared: request an account clarification and get the record corrected while documents are easy to find.
Does my ETF portfolio count as pension?: It counts as capital that must be converted into monthly income by some withdrawal plan, which means explicit assumptions about returns, inflation and how long retirement lasts. Any tool that turns a depot into a monthly figure is making those assumptions; the only question is whether it shows them to you. Insist on seeing them.

Miravel puts your earned pension, your spending and your assets into one projection across the decades and shows you the coverage gap with visible assumptions. Your data stays in your browser. Start free now.