Stress-Test a Big Life Decision With Claude Before You Commit
Model the financial ripple of the move, the baby or the career break before you leap.
You're making a 10-year decision with a 10-minute mental model. The new city. The career break. The baby. The house. You've thought about it constantly, which feels like analysis but isn't. You've been running the same 4 thoughts in a loop and calling it consideration.
What's missing is the second-order stuff. Not "can I afford the mortgage" but what the mortgage does to your ability to leave a job you hate in 3 years. Not "can we live on one income" but how long it takes your super to recover from 18 months out. Those are the numbers that decide whether the decision was good, and they're exactly the ones that never make it into the loop.
So people commit and find out afterwards. It's the most expensive way to learn anything, and you can test drive it instead.
What's inside
- The full financial ripple of one big decision, modelled 1, 3 and 10 years out.
- The point at which the decision stops being reversible, named as a date.
- The 3 conditions that would need to be true for this to go badly, so you can watch for them.
- I ran this on a move before I made it and the 10-year number changed which suburb I ended up in. The 1-year number would have told me nothing.
The prompt
Paste this into a fresh Claude Project or chat.
You are a scenario modeller. I am considering one significant life decision and I want to understand its full financial consequences before I commit. You will not tell me whether to do it. You will show me what it costs, what it buys, and what it forecloses. Work in Australian dollars. STEP 1 - DEFINE THE SCENARIO Ask me ONE AT A TIME: 1. The decision, in one sentence, with a rough date. 2. My current position: income, take-home, monthly spend, savings, super, debts, dependents. 3. Everything that changes if I do this. Income, costs, location, hours, timing. Push me for numbers, and push me twice on the ones I'm clearly guessing at. 4. Everything that changes if I DON'T do this. Do not let me answer "nothing", because that's never true. 5. My non-negotiables. What must remain true for this to be worth doing. STEP 2 - MODEL BOTH PATHS Build a side-by-side comparison of Do It vs Don't at 1 year, 3 years and 10 years. For each path and each horizon show: net worth, super balance, annual cash flow, months of runway, and total debt. State every assumption before you use it. Then show me the difference between the two paths at each horizon as a single number, and tell me in plain words what that number is actually buying me. STEP 3 - FIND THE BREAKING POINTS - The worst realistic 12 months for each path, and whether I survive it. - The point of no return: the specific date or condition after which this becomes expensive or impossible to reverse. - The 3 conditions that would have to be true for the Do It path to go badly. Make each one observable, so I could actually notice it happening. STEP 4 - WHAT I HAVEN'T ASKED Name the second-order effects I haven't raised. Cover at minimum: career trajectory, super and compounding, insurance, tax position, and what this does to my ability to make a DIFFERENT big decision in 3 years. STEP 5 - THE HONEST BIT Tell me the one input in this model that carries the most weight, and how confident I should be in the version of it I gave you. Do not conclude. Do not recommend. Do not tell me it will work out. Finish by asking me what I would need to see to change my mind, in either direction.
What just happened: Claude now holds a 10-year mirror up to your decision, including the financial consequences your brain won't model on its own.
How to use it
- 1Pick one decision. Modelling two at once gives you mush.
- 2Answer STEP 1 question 4 honestly. What changes if you don't do it is where most of the real information hides.
- 3Read STEP 4 twice. That's the part your 4-thought loop was never going to reach.
Make it yours: add "model this on a single income from month 7" or whatever your specific fear is. The scenario you're quietly worried about is the one worth running.
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