Maternity Leave Savings Calculator

Save your monthly take-home times the number of months you'll be unpaid. For 12 weeks (3 months) unpaid at $5,000/month, that's $15,000. Add one-time baby costs (delivery, nursery, gear). Start saving as soon as you plan for a baby.

FMLA (Family and Medical Leave Act) provides up to 12 weeks of job-protected leave but does not require paid leave. Most US employers offer unpaid FMLA. Some states (CA, NY, NJ, MA, etc.) have paid family leave programs. Check your state and employer.

FMLA covers 12 weeks for eligible employees (50+ employees, 1 year tenure). Some employers offer more. State laws may add paid weeks. Use the calculator with your actual leave duration and paid/unpaid mix.

Save your income gap in advance. At $5,000/month take-home and 12 weeks unpaid, target $15,000. Add 2–4 months buffer for one-time baby costs. Start saving 1–2 years before if possible. Check state paid leave—you may qualify even if employer doesn't offer it.

Weeks convert at 52/12, or 4.333 weeks per month, so 12 weeks is 2.769 months of pay rather than 3. At $5,000 a month that is $13,846.15 instead of $15,000 - a $1,153.85 difference on a single leave. The distinction matters most when you are matching the target against a paycheck calendar. The 26-week preset is the one that lands exactly on 6.0 months, because 26 weeks is precisely half a year.

The engine deliberately returns no value in two situations: your current savings already meet or exceed the target, or your monthly savings entry is zero. If it is the first, the result switches from a gap to a surplus and no timeline is needed. If it is the second, enter a realistic monthly amount and the timeline appears. The figure it returns is always rounded up to a whole month, so it never implies you finish mid-month.

Only costs you pay once and want covered by the same pot: delivery and hospital out-of-pocket amounts, nursery and gear, and any childcare deposit due before you go back. The calculator has exactly two components - the income gap and this field - so recurring costs that start after you return to work do not belong here. Put those in a monthly budget instead, or the target will look larger than the leave itself requires.

The engine applies one paid percentage across the whole leave, so a phased arrangement needs a small adjustment. Either enter a blended percentage - total pay you will receive during leave, divided by what the same weeks would pay at full salary - or enter only the unpaid stretch of weeks at 0% and treat the paid weeks as covered. Whichever route you take, add the one-time costs once, not in both runs.