Set up a Thrift Savings Plan (TSP)

Find the tax split on your TSP records

Gather a recent TSP statement or account report showing the Traditional and Roth balances, the account owner, the balance date, and any fund detail. A list of fund values for the entire TSP is not enough to tell how much of each fund belongs to Traditional versus Roth money.

The TSP is a workplace retirement plan for this planning purpose. In YARCalc, use 401(k) for Traditional TSP and Roth 401(k) for Roth TSP. If you have both, create two accounts with names such as “Traditional TSP” and “Roth TSP.” Give both the same actual owner. Do not select Traditional IRA or Roth IRA while the money remains in the TSP.

TSP savings are separate from a FERS or military pension, Social Security, and any temporary retirement supplement. Enter those payments under Income & Benefits when they apply; do not add their future payments to the TSP balance.

Add each TSP tax balance and its holdings

In Accounts & Holdings, add a 401(k) account for the Traditional balance and a Roth 401(k) account for the Roth balance. Add a holding inside each account. If you only know each tax balance, use one clearly named Temporary total-value estimate per account and replace it when reliable holding detail is available. Do not enter the same balance as both an estimate and detailed holdings.

When the TSP record separates holdings by tax source, add each fund under the matching account. Enter its fund name, number of shares or units, and current TSP share price. TSP core funds do not need a made-up public ticker; leave Ticker blank and enter the price manually. Total cost basis is not needed for these retirement-account holdings.

If the fund listing combines Traditional and Roth shares, use the tax balances as the reliable starting values. Do not copy the combined fund rows into both accounts or allocate them between the two by guesswork. You can use a broad estimated holding in each account until the TSP supplies a source-level breakdown.

Choose fund behavior and enter expected deposits

Classify C, S, and I Fund holdings as Stock and F Fund as Bond. Use Bond as a broad planning class for G Fund, or a supported fixed annual total-return assumption if you have a defensible rate to test; YARCalc does not reproduce the G Fund guarantee or its changing credited rate. Do not enter G or F Fund as an individual Treasury bond with a maturity date.

An L Fund contains a changing mix of investments. A single Stock or Bond class will simplify its risk. If the mix matters to your analysis, represent its current stock and bond portions as separate, clearly named planning holdings whose values sum to the L Fund value, then revise those portions when the mix changes. YARCalc does not apply the L Fund glide path automatically.

Add dated contribution periods for the annual amounts you expect to reach each account. Traditional employee deposits and agency automatic or matching deposits belong in the Traditional TSP account; Roth employee deposits belong in the Roth TSP account. Include the agency deposits in the Traditional annual amount only once. YARCalc does not calculate agency matching, vesting, or annual contribution limits for you, and contribution periods stop at the owner’s saved retirement date.

Reconcile the saved plan with the TSP statement

After Save and return, compare each account’s modeled value with the matching Traditional or Roth TSP balance on the same statement date. The two YARCalc accounts together should equal the TSP total, with no duplicated fund or estimated balance.

Review the account owner, fund classes, and expected contributions. Then open Projection to inspect withdrawals, taxes, and required distributions. Traditional withdrawals are modeled as ordinary income; the Roth workplace balance uses the model’s tax-free withdrawal treatment and has no lifetime owner RMD in the projection.

Know which TSP details need manual review

YARCalc currently has no native TSP holdings importer. Its CSV importer recognizes Fidelity and Schwab exports plus generic files with unambiguous name, symbol, quantity, and total-cost-basis columns. A TSP Investment Details or Account Activity download should not be assumed to import correctly; enter its balances and holdings manually unless a reviewed file meets the generic format.

The model does not calculate TSP-specific loans, withdrawal eligibility or penalties, Roth distribution qualification, in-plan conversions, agency match formulas, vesting, or tax-exempt combat-pay basis. A Traditional TSP balance containing tax-exempt combat-pay contributions cannot be represented accurately as wholly taxable Traditional 401(k) money; seek plan and tax guidance before relying on its withdrawal-tax estimate.

Use current TSP records for actual fund prices, the Traditional/Roth split, and plan rules. YARCalc’s account types are planning approximations, not a determination of what a TSP payment will be taxed or permitted to do.