The payout order in your drawdown

Two households with the same wealth and the same spending can end up with very different after-tax amounts — solely because they spend their funds in a different order. The order decides which tax brackets the payouts hit and how hard the state pension supplement is tapered.

Why the order changes the monthly amount

Each source carries its own tax: pension payouts are personal income, share portfolios are taxed as share income on sale, the aktiesparekonto continuously at 17%, and the aldersopsparing is tax-free. The taxes are progressive — ladders with allowances and thresholds — so the total tax burden depends on how much is drawn from which source in which year. Same total, different distribution, different tax.

The ladders that drive it

• Personal income (ratepension, livrente, ATP, state pension): personal allowance DKK 54,100, then bottom-bracket and municipal tax; middle bracket above DKK 641,200, top bracket above DKK 777,900 (2026).
• Share income (free portfolios, on sale): 27% up to DKK 79,400 a year, 42% above (2026).
• Capital income (interest, bonds): taxed under its own rules with an extra DKK 55,000 allowance before the top rate bites.
• Running in the background: 15.3% PAL tax on pension returns and 17% inventory tax on the aktiesparekonto — see the guide on PAL tax and ASK.

The taper effect

From the state pension age an extra “tax” appears: pension payouts beyond an allowance taper the state pension supplement by 30.9% for singles and 16% for couples (2026). A ratepension krone in those years costs both income tax and lost supplement — while a krone from the aldersopsparing or free funds doesn’t touch the supplement the same way. The details are in the guide on the state pension and offsetting.

Rules of thumb — and why they don’t always hold

“Spend free funds first”, “empty the ratepension before the state pension”, “save the aldersopsparing for last” — each rule is right in some situations and expensive in others. If you don’t fill the personal allowance and the low brackets in the years before the state pension, you waste cheap tax capacity; draw too hard on the ratepension later and you pay the taper on top. The right answer depends on the amounts, the ages and the whole household — it is a calculation, not a mnemonic.

An example of the mechanics

A stylised example: a household stops three years before the state pension age. If the ratepension starts at the state pension age, the bridge years rest on free funds alone (share tax) and the instalments later stack on top of the state pension — taper included. If the instalments start in the bridge years instead, they fill the personal allowance and bottom bracket while the supplement isn’t yet in play — and the free funds can be spread over more years under the 27% share income threshold. Same wealth, two sequences, a noticeably different monthly amount.

How NestEgg calculates it

NestEgg’s optimiser tries the pensions’ start dates and lengths across the whole plan and finds the highest monthly after-tax amount that lasts the whole way — brackets, PAL, ASK and the taper calculated month by month. It never moves a choice you have locked yourself: your decisions stand, the optimiser fills in the rest.