Altersvorsorgedepot Rechner 2027 | Germany ETF Reform

What killed Riester, and what the depot fixes

Riester's fatal flaw was the 100% capital guarantee: providers had to promise every contributed euro back at retirement, which forced portfolios into low-yield bonds and swallowed returns in guarantee costs and fees. After twenty years, millions of contracts had produced almost nothing beyond the subsidies themselves. The Altersvorsorgereformgesetz of May 2026 draws the obvious conclusion: from 2027, new contracts may drop the guarantee entirely and invest fully in equities.

The subsidy mechanics stay familiar, base allowance plus child allowances, but their destination changes everything. €840 a year of state money compounding at an equity return for 30 years is worth roughly €85,000 of Jonas's final €267,000; the same subsidies trickling into a guaranteed bond product would end up worth less than half that. Same state generosity, radically different outcome, purely because of what the money is allowed to sit in.

The subsidy is a return you cannot buy anywhere else

Look at year one in isolation: Jonas deposits €1,800 and the state adds €840, an instant 47% top-up before the market moves at all. For a two-child family the numbers get steeper still: €1,800 in, €1,140 of subsidies, a 63% first-day return. Few legal structures in the German system hand an eligible family that kind of entry bonus.

The design also front-loads generosity for small savers: the 50% match on the first €360 means even €30 a month captures €180 of state money. The priority order for a tight budget is therefore clear, fund the first €360 before anything else, then climb toward €1,800 as income allows, and treat amounts above €1,800 as ordinary (still useful) investing without extra base subsidy.

Decisions for 2026: wait, switch, or neither

If you have NO subsidised contract today, the calendar answer is simple: the depot opens 1 January 2027, and for most savers it will beat opening a legacy Riester contract in late 2026. Waiting a few months costs little; locking into the old guarantee regime for decades costs a lot.

If you HOLD a Riester contract, do not torch it reflexively. Existing contracts keep their old rules, and accrued guarantees, paid fees, and (for civil servants and high-subsidy families) favourable terms can make keeping or pausing it smarter than cancelling, cancellation claws back subsidies and crystallises fees. The clean framing: old contract decisions are about sunk costs and exit penalties; new savings from 2027 almost certainly belong in the depot.

Two open items to watch as the launch approaches: the certified provider list and their fee schedules (over 30 years, a 0.3% fee gap moves the end value by tens of thousands), and the payout-phase rules, the reform modernised accumulation, while decumulation details continue to be refined in regulation. The calculator models the accumulation math that is already law.

One planning nuance the headline numbers hide: the depot's subsidies do not depend on your marginal tax rate, which makes the scheme unusually valuable for LOWER earners and part-time workers, precisely the group Riester also targeted but failed through fees. A parent earning €25,000 collects the same €840 of allowances on an €1,800 contribution as a €125,000 earner, and for the lower earner that is a materially bigger slice of their savings capacity. High earners, meanwhile, should treat the depot as one layer in a stack, alongside occupational pensions and taxable ETF savings, rather than the whole plan; the subsidy caps mean its advantage is front-loaded on the first €1,800 a year, and money beyond that competes on ordinary terms with every other account they hold. The clean rule for everyone: capture the full subsidy first, then decide where the next euro goes.