Use this calculator to see how investing large amounts of money in the beginning years of a systematic investment program increases your overall return in the long run. Front-loading your early investments with relatively more dollars amplifies the effect of compounding over time. By comparison, in some cases reversing the strategy—investing less early and more later—you will actually end up with significantly less money.

Here is an example: Assume you invested $1,000 for the first 20 years at an annual return of 5% and you invested $500 for the next 20 years at an annual return of 5%. At the end of 40 years you would have $1,326,005.42 having invested $360,000.00 for a return on investment (ROI) of 268.33%.