Is my retirement portfolio on track? How to check for yourself

The standard benchmarks skip one crucial variable. Here's the fuller picture, including what you're paying in fees

By Scott Blandford, Founder & CEO, Truthifi · Reviewed by the Truthifi Team · Updated July 27, 2026

The short answer: If you're asking "am I on track for retirement," start with an age benchmark, then subtract what you pay in fees. Fidelity's guideline is 1x your salary by 30, 3x by 40, 6x by 50, 8x by 60 and 10x by 67. You're on track if your fee-adjusted savings clear your age's milestone and your allocation, fund overlap and concentration fit your timeline. The rest of this guide shows how to check each piece.

You opened a retirement calculator, typed in your numbers, and stared at the result trying to decide whether to feel relieved or terrified. You're not alone. According to the 2025 EBRI Retirement Confidence Survey, 67% of workers say they're confident about retirement. But the Federal Reserve's Survey of Household Economics and Decisionmaking found that only 31% of non-retirees actually feel their retirement saving is on track, down from 40% in 2021.

That gap between confidence and certainty is why you're here. Search "how much should I have saved for retirement" or plug your numbers into a retirement calculator by age, and you'll usually get a savings target and little else. Most of those benchmarks skip one variable: the fees you're paying to stay "on track."

Fidelity's widely cited guideline says save 10x your salary by age 67. That's a reasonable starting point. But it doesn't subtract the approximately 1.0% median advisory fee that many advised investors pay, a fee that compounds against your portfolio every year you pay it. By the end of this article, you'll know how to check five dimensions of portfolio health that most benchmarks ignore, a framework you can use whether you work with an advisor or manage your own money.

Is your portfolio on track?

Most retirement benchmarks answer one question: "Have you saved enough?" But if you're asking "is my portfolio on track," the answer requires more than a savings number. A complete portfolio health assessment measures five dimensions, and the one that changes the math most is the one standard benchmarks usually leave out.

What "on track" actually means, and why most benchmarks get it wrong

Fidelity recommends saving 1x your salary by 30, 3x by 40, 6x by 50, 8x by 60, and 10x by 67. These milestones assume a 15% savings rate, a retirement age of 67, and income replacement of about 45% from savings (with Social Security covering the rest). Millions of investors use them as their north star.

Here's what they miss: Fidelity's milestones, like most published benchmarks, don't subtract the cost of the advice or tools you're using to reach them.

The national average advisory fee sits at approximately 1.0% of assets under management, with a typical range of 0.50%–1.50% according to Kitces Research 2024 and U.S. News. Separately, the asset-weighted average equity mutual fund expense ratio is 0.40% according to the ICI Fact Book 2025. These two figures come from different samples, so they won't stack neatly for everyone. An advised investor in low-cost index funds may pay far less than 0.40% in fund expenses. Still, for an investor paying a 1.0% advisory fee on top of average-cost equity funds, total annual costs could approach 1.40%, and that compounds year after year against the very savings the benchmarks are measuring.

None of this makes advisors or benchmarks bad, but it does mean the scoreboard may be showing an incomplete score. Fidelity's benchmarks are useful directional guidance; they just weren't designed to account for the cost of its own advisory services. The same is true for Empower, Edward Jones, and many other firms that publish retirement milestones while also charging fees on the assets those milestones measure. The question isn't whether benchmarks are helpful. It's whether the one you're using accounts for what you're paying.

The five dimensions of portfolio health

These five dimensions determine whether your portfolio is actually working for you:

1. Allocation fit. Does your mix of stocks, bonds, and cash match your age, timeline, and risk tolerance?

2. Overlap exposure. Are you holding the same stocks in multiple funds without realizing it?

3. Concentration risk. Is too much of your money in a single stock, sector, or region?

4. Fee drag. How much of your portfolio's growth is going to advisory fees, fund expense ratios, and transaction costs?

5. Savings trajectory. Given your current savings rate, contributions, and fee-adjusted returns, are you on pace for your target?

Many retirement calculators check dimension five and stop there. A full portfolio health check evaluates all five together, across the accounts you connect. That's the difference between knowing your balance and knowing whether your balance is working.

Fee-adjusted retirement benchmarks by age

Fidelity's savings factors are among the most widely cited retirement benchmarks in America. Here's what they look like after you subtract what you're paying in fees, a calculation we haven't seen a major brokerage publish.

What the standard benchmarks say, and what they skip

For a household earning $75,000 per year (approximately the U.S. median household income), Fidelity's benchmarks translate to clear dollar targets: $75,000 saved by 30, $225,000 by 40, $450,000 by 50, and $750,000 by 67.

A caveat first: the table below is an illustrative estimate built on simplified compounding, not a forecast. It assumes fees begin at age 30 and a 7% nominal gross return. Treat the dollar figures as approximate and the direction as the takeaway.

How to read this table: At age 67, Fidelity says you need $750,000. Under this simplified model, paying a 1.00% advisory fee for 37 years leaves that target worth roughly $508,500 in fee-adjusted terms. That's $241,500 of growth potential lost to fee drag (the table's $750,000 target minus its $508,500 fee-adjusted figure). At 0.50%, a fee level at the low end of many advisory schedules, the gap is still $133,500 ($750,000 minus $616,500).

Across the fee levels shown, fees reduce effective savings at 67 by roughly 9% to 44%, depending on the rate and how long you pay it. Other methods will produce different dollar amounts, but the direction holds: higher fees paid for longer leave less at retirement.

How to calculate your fee-adjusted on-track number

Here's the estimated impact across different portfolio sizes, using the same simplified model with a 7% gross return and 20 years to retirement:

Methodology note: These figures are directional estimates from the same simplified fee-drag model as the age table, not outputs of a single closed-form formula. Because the time horizon differs (20 years here, 37 years above), the two tables won't scale into each other directly. Different assumptions about contributions, timing and compounding will produce different dollar amounts. Use them to compare fee levels against each other, then check your own accounts for your actual figure.

Under these assumptions, a 1% fee on a $500,000 portfolio costs approximately $123,400 over 20 years in lost growth, a number you can weigh against the services you're receiving.

Advisory fees do pay for something. Kitces Research 2024 data on how advisors spend their time suggests a sizable share, around 41% by its measure, goes to financial planning work rather than portfolio management alone. That work can include tax optimization, estate coordination and behavioral coaching during market downturns. For some investors, those services are worth significantly more than the fee. For others, a lower-cost approach makes more sense. If you work with an advisor, these tables are a starting point for asking what the fee covers. If you invest on your own, they show what your lower costs are worth over time.

The point isn't to pay the least. It's to know the cost so you can evaluate whether it matches the value.

Get your own fee-adjusted number: Truthifi pulls your linked accounts into a single view and checks them for fees, concentration and other issues, including fee drag. Truthifi connects to 18,000+ financial institutions, per Truthifi platform data, so accounts held at different firms can sit side by side. Run your free Portfolio Health Check

Common portfolio problems the health check reveals

Fee drag is one piece. Here are two more problems that can quietly erode portfolio health, and that many investors can't see without the right tools.

Portfolio overlap and concentration risk

If you own an S&P 500 index fund, a large-cap growth fund, and a total market fund, you might feel diversified. But according to RBC Wealth Management analysis, the top 10 stocks in the S&P 500 now represent approximately 40–41% of the entire index. That's a record high, nearly double the roughly 20% share in 2015. If three of your funds all hold Apple, Microsoft, and NVIDIA in their top positions, you may have far more concentration in a handful of companies than your fund names suggest.

On Reddit's r/Bogleheads and r/personalfinance communities, threads about the portfolio overlap problem come up regularly. A common version: an investor discovers that a carefully chosen five-fund portfolio is largely holding the same 10 stocks three times over. That isn't a failure of the investor. It's a visibility problem: brokerage statements generally aren't designed to show overlap across multiple accounts and custodians.

Then there's home bias. U.S. stocks represent approximately 60–65% of global market capitalization, yet many American investors hold a much larger domestic share of their equities, sometimes 80% or more. If you're wondering whether you have too much tech in your portfolio, especially with the Magnificent 7 driving record concentration, a health check that includes international allocation and concentration analysis can catch these gaps.

Active vs. passive, and why it matters for your fee-adjusted returns

According to the SPIVA U.S. Scorecard, over 15 years, more than 90% of actively managed large-cap funds underperformed the S&P 500. In 2024 specifically, 65% underperformed. In the first half of 2025, the rate improved somewhat to 54%.

This doesn't mean active management is the wrong choice. Some actively managed funds earn their fees through strategies aimed at managing taxes, downside protection, or access to strategies unavailable in index funds. But if you're paying active fund fees for market-matching performance, that cost compounds alongside your advisory fee, and both subtract from your on-track number.

The question to ask: what am I actually getting for what I'm paying? If the answer is "I'm not sure," Truthifi's fee tools are built for that. It surfaces the advisory, fund and transaction fees in the accounts you link, so you can see the fuller picture and decide whether the value matches the price. Free to try.

Model portfolios by life stage

Here's what a healthy, age-appropriate portfolio can look like, and how to keep it on track over time.

Age-based allocation: how to match your portfolio to your timeline

The simplest framework adjusts your stock-to-bond ratio as you approach retirement. A common guideline: subtract your age from 110 or 120 to estimate your stock percentage. A 40-year-old might target 70–80% stocks; a 60-year-old, 50–60%.

Target-date funds automate this with what's called a "glide path," gradually shifting from stocks to bonds as the target date approaches. They've grown enormously: according to Morningstar's 2025 target-date fund report, target-date fund strategies exceeded $4 trillion in assets by the end of 2024, with the average asset-weighted expense ratio dropping to 0.29%. That's an industry-wide average; the funds in your own plan may cost more or less, which is why checking your actual expense ratios matters.

So are target-date funds worth it? Here's the math on the tradeoff over 30 years of $10,000 annual contributions at 7% gross return:

The three-fund portfolio grows to roughly $41,000 more, about 4.4% of the total. That's meaningful but modest. Target-date funds have genuine advantages: automatic rebalancing, age-appropriate allocation shifts, and very little maintenance.

Whether a target-date fund is good or bad depends on the investor. Morningstar's data shows that TDF investors who stayed in for 15 years saw average annualized returns of 7.3%. For investors who value simplicity, TDFs may be worth the extra cost. For disciplined DIY investors who will actually rebalance on their own, the three-fund portfolio saves money.

Neither approach is wrong for everyone. The right choice depends on your temperament, your time, and whether you'll actually follow through on rebalancing. The three-fund route suits anyone willing to rebalance once a year, while a target-date fund is the sounder pick for someone who wants diversification without the upkeep. Truthifi evaluates either approach the same way.

How to monitor your portfolio going forward

A portfolio health check isn't a one-time event. Markets move, life changes, and allocations drift. The question is how often to check.

According to Vanguard's rebalancing research, annual rebalancing captures most of the benefits. Monthly or quarterly rebalancing adds transaction costs without meaningful improvement. A practical rule: check once a year, or whenever any asset class drifts more than 5 percentage points from your target.

Here's where the tools diverge. Morningstar's Portfolio X-Ray offers deep analysis, but full access requires a Morningstar Investor (formerly Premium) subscription, listed at $249/year at the time of writing, and it covers funds in Morningstar's database. Empower's dashboard is free, and it also offers advisory services to high-balance users at published rates of 0.49%–0.89% AUM at the time of writing. That's worth weighing against the fee math above before you opt in. Fidelity's tools are free, though some features are geared to Fidelity-held accounts. Pricing changes, so confirm current rates on each provider's site.

When you evaluate any portfolio-health tool, five questions separate a complete assessment from a partial one:

• Does it include fee drag? Many brokerage tools measure your savings against a target but don't subtract the advisory and fund fees eroding it.

• Does it show a cross-account view? A tool tied to a single custodian can only see the accounts held there, not your full picture.

• Is it personalized to your income and timeline, or a generic rule of thumb?

• Can it tell you "you're fine"? As with the Empower and Morningstar examples above, a tool that earns from advisory services has less incentive to conclude that no change is needed. Check whether the tool you're using has that incentive.

• Does it disclose its own revenue conflicts? If a tool earns from advisory referrals, its nudge to "talk to an advisor" isn't neutral.

That last pair is where business-model incentives matter most, not because any one firm has bad intentions. The same questions apply to self-directed investors: a low-cost portfolio can still carry overlap or drift that nobody is reviewing. If you work with an advisor, an independent check gives you both a shared set of numbers to discuss.

Where Truthifi fits: Truthifi runs on a flat subscription, with no AUM fee, no commissions and no referral revenue. Its Portfolio Health Check reads your Truthifi Score trend, open findings and fees, covering fee drag, overlap, concentration and allocation drift in one pass. Connect your accounts and run the health check, free with no credit card required.

Your annual portfolio review checklist: check allocation drift (is my asset allocation right for my age?), scan for overlap (am I invested in the same stocks twice across different funds?), verify fee levels, compare to fee-adjusted benchmarks, and share your findings with your advisor. Knowing how to check if your portfolio is on track is a skill worth practicing every year. A good advisor welcomes clients who come in informed; transparency strengthens the relationship rather than threatening it.

If you'd like to go deeper on ongoing monitoring or hidden fund overlap, Truthifi's education library covers both topics in more detail. Curious how account connections are protected? Read how Truthifi handles security.

One more thing before the FAQ: Truthifi is not an investment adviser and doesn't give investment, tax or legal advice.

FAQ: Portfolio assessment

How do I know if my portfolio is on track for retirement?

Compare your total savings across all accounts to fee-adjusted benchmarks for your age. Fidelity's guideline is 10x your salary by 67, but subtract advisory fees to get your real number. Check five metrics: allocation fit, overlap exposure, concentration risk, fee drag, and savings trajectory. A free portfolio health check can automate this across your connected accounts.

How often should I review my portfolio?

Evidence from Vanguard shows annual rebalancing captures most benefits; monthly or quarterly reviews add costs without meaningful improvement. Run a full health check once a year or after major life events like a job change, inheritance, marriage, or home purchase. If any single asset class drifts more than 5% from your target, that's a signal to rebalance.

Is a 60/40 portfolio still a good strategy?

Many investors ask whether the 60/40 portfolio is dead or alive. Historically, a 60/40 stock/bond portfolio has delivered positive returns over most rolling 20-year periods in modern market history, but it may not be optimal for every age. It faced its worst modern year in 2022, when both stocks and bonds declined at the same time. That doesn't mean the strategy is broken.

Younger investors can typically afford more stock exposure; those near retirement may benefit from a more conservative mix. The right allocation depends on your timeline, risk tolerance, income needs, and fee structure.

How many funds should I have in my portfolio?

Most evidence suggests 3–5 broadly diversified funds provide sufficient diversification. More funds doesn't mean more diversification; it often means more overlap. If your portfolio has too many funds, you may be experiencing portfolio bloat: too many holdings duplicating the same underlying stocks at higher cost.

A three-fund portfolio (U.S. stocks, international stocks, bonds) covers the major asset classes.

Is my portfolio too aggressive for my age?

A common guideline subtracts your age from 110 or 120 to estimate an appropriate stock percentage, so a 40-year-old might target 70–80% stocks. But this is rough guidance. If you're wondering "am I invested in the right funds for my age," the answer depends on more than a formula.

Your specific allocation should reflect your timeline, income stability, risk tolerance, and other income sources like Social Security or pensions. A portfolio that feels "too aggressive" in a down market may be exactly right for your 25-year horizon.

What is a good portfolio risk score?

A "good" risk score depends entirely on your age and timeline. A 30-year-old's portfolio should typically score higher (more growth-oriented) than a 60-year-old's (more preservation-oriented). The key isn't hitting a specific number. It's matching your risk level to your actual retirement timeline and comfort with market volatility.

How do I check for portfolio overlap?

List your top 10 holdings across all funds in all accounts. If the same companies, like Apple, Microsoft, NVIDIA, or Amazon, appear in three or more funds, you have overlap. A portfolio overlap checker can automate this. Truthifi checks the linked accounts you connect and shows where you're double- or triple-exposed.

What are the best free portfolio analysis tools?

Options include Empower (a free dashboard, with optional paid advisory services), Fidelity Retirement Score (free, and strongest with Fidelity accounts), and Morningstar X-Ray (full access requires a Morningstar Investor subscription, listed at $249/year at the time of writing). The key question: does the tool earn revenue from advisory referrals? If so, its assessment may lean toward recommending services rather than giving you a straight answer.

Should I use a target-date fund or build my own portfolio?

Target-date funds are simple and effective: they automatically adjust your allocation as you age, with average fees of 0.29%. A DIY three-fund portfolio can cost as little as 0.04% but requires you to rebalance on your own. Over 30 years, the cost difference is roughly $41,000 on $10,000/year contributions. Choose simplicity or savings; either approach works.

How would my portfolio do in a 2008-style crash?

By rough historical estimates, a portfolio with 60% stocks would have lost about 35–40% during the 2008–09 financial crisis. A more conservative 40% stock allocation would have lost around 20–25%. If you're wondering whether you should change your portfolio in a market downturn, a portfolio stress test estimates your downside before it arrives, so you can decide whether your allocation lets you sleep at night. The best time to check is before a crash tests your resolve for real.

Is the S&P 500 too concentrated right now?

According to RBC Wealth Management, the top 10 stocks represent approximately 40–41% of the S&P 500, a record high. If you hold an S&P 500 index fund plus individual tech stocks, you may have far more concentration than you realize. Consider whether your equity allocation is meaningfully diversified or just holding the same handful of companies through different fund wrappers.

What is a retirement savings benchmark by age?

Fidelity suggests saving 1x your salary by 30, 3x by 40, 6x by 50, 8x by 60, and 10x by 67. These are useful starting points but have two blind spots. First, standard retirement benchmarks typically don't factor in fee drag, the compounding cost of advisory fees and fund expenses that erode your actual purchasing power.

Second, there's a real argument that benchmarks set too high can discourage people from saving at all. T. Rowe Price research suggests more achievable targets may motivate better outcomes. A fee-adjusted benchmark accounts for what you're keeping after costs, and gives you a clearer picture of whether you're on track for your retirement timeline.

One last idea to carry into your next review: the fee that matters most is the one with the most years left to compound. A 40-year-old paying 1% has about 27 years of drag ahead before 67; a 60-year-old has about seven. That's why a fee conversation at 40 can be worth more than the same conversation at 60, even when the balance is smaller. Run the numbers while time is still on your side.

Ready to check your own numbers? Whether you work with an advisor or invest on your own, connect your accounts and run your free Portfolio Health Check to see your whole financial picture in one place: free, no credit card required. Wondering how your connections are protected? See how Truthifi keeps your accounts secure.

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About the author: Scott Blandford is the founder and CEO of Truthifi, a portfolio monitoring platform built on a flat subscription rather than asset-based fees.

About the reviewer: This article was reviewed by the Truthifi Team, which checks Truthifi's education content against the sources cited in each guide. More guides are available in the Truthifi education library.

Disclaimer: This portfolio-tracking guide is for educational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. Truthifi is a portfolio monitoring platform, not a financial advisor. All calculations are illustrative estimates based on simplified assumptions and should not be used as the sole basis for financial decisions. What's happened in the past with these funds doesn't guarantee what happens next. Use these five dimensions as a starting point, and consult a qualified financial professional before making investment decisions. Data sources are cited throughout; verify current figures before relying on them.