# Jar Shelf

> A savings-goal planner for several goals at once, at https://jar-shelf.skillsafe.ai/. List up to six things you are saving for (an emergency fund, retirement, education, a home deposit, a car or big purchase, a trip or event, anything else) with a target, what is saved so far and the month each is wanted by, plus the one amount you can put aside each month. The page works out the monthly each goal needs, shares your monthly amount down the list in order, and shows every goal as a jar on a shelf with a call: on track, stretch the date, top up or paused. One metered run reads the plan back goal by goal.

URL: https://jar-shelf.skillsafe.ai/
API tutorial: https://jar-shelf.skillsafe.ai/api.html

## What it does

- Inputs: a currency symbol ($, £, €, ₹, ¥), the monthly amount to share, an assumed growth rate a year, an optional yearly price rise, the month saving starts, and up to six goals, each with a name, a kind, a target, the amount saved so far, the month it is wanted by and whether that date is fixed. The list order is the funding order; a button puts it in the usual order (emergency fund, retirement, education, home, then the rest; fixed dates before ones that can move; then the soonest).
- Free, in the browser: the monthly each goal needs from the sinking-fund formula (payment = gap x r / ((1 + r)^n - 1), monthly compounding, rounded up), targets grown by the price rise when given, the money shared down the list, a call per goal (on track when it gets all it needs; paused when it gets nothing; stretch the date when it gets part and its date can move, with the later month; top up when it gets part and its date is fixed, with the shortfall a month), a verdict (first match wins: any top up or pause is short each month; any stretch is fits if dates move; otherwise it all fits), where each goal's money could wait (easy-access savings within 3 years or for an emergency fund, mostly savings or short-term bonds at 3 to 7 years, a spread of long-term investments beyond), a shelf-and-timeline drawing as SVG/PNG, monthly reminders as an .ics calendar file, and Markdown, CSV and JSON downloads. The sums are checked against the source skill's own reference script.
- Metered (one run on gpt-terra): a headline, one short read per goal in funding order with where to keep its money, the one choice the plan leaves you with, the split for the first month and when to look again. The run never changes the sums, the calls, the order or the verdict.

## Contract

POST https://api.skillsafe.ai/v1/app-api/run with string fields: task = "plan", currency, monthly, goals (the names, in funding order), facts (the verdict, the monthly line, the assumptions, the start and look-again months, the funding order and one line per goal). The reply is one JSON object: {task, verdict, headline, goals: [{id, call, say, keep_in}], tradeoff, first_month, checkpoint}.

## Notes

General information, not financial advice. Growth is an assumption, never a promise, and investments can fall as well as rise. Built on the SkillSafe skill @joellewis/savings-goals (https://skillsafe.ai/skill/@joellewis/savings-goals, MIT): required monthly savings, goal prioritisation and balancing competing goals.