retirement planning

President Obama’s 2015 Budget Includes A Possible Retirement Planning Game-Changer

Yesterday, President Obama unveiled his Fiscal Year 2015 Budget. As has been the case with previous budgets, this year’s version includes a number of proposed changes aimed at retirement accounts. Six out of the 7 provisions detailed below, or similar versions of them, were included in President Obama’s Fiscal Year 2014 Budget last year.

Gifting-During-Life Strategy: Does It Make Sense for YOUR Family?

When it comes to estate planning, one of the primary goals is to transfer as much of a person's assets to their intended beneficiaries at the lowest cost or, in other words, by paying the least amount of tax. Today, the federal estate tax exemption is $5,340,000 per person. It is also portable (can be transferred) between spouses, giving them a maximum exemption of $10,680,000 per couple and the maximum rate is 40%. That is a far cry from where we’ve been.

When You Should Leave Your Employer Retirement Plan Money In The Plan

When you are entitled to receive withdrawals from your employer's retirement plan, such as a 401(k), a rollover to an IRA is a smart move in most cases. But there are some times when it’s best to leave the money in the employer plan and NOT do a rollover to an IRA. We detail those scenarios below.

Distributions From a Roth IRA Conversion

Suppose you are one of the many retirement account owners who converted funds to a Roth IRA in 2010 when there was a special 2-year “deal” on paying the taxes. Now you are wondering when you can take a distribution of those funds. The simple answer is that you can always take a distribution of your converted funds. However, depending on what you withdraw, you may not be happy with the tax consequences. Here are the rules.

IRA Contributions After Death

The general rule for making IRA contributions after an individual dies is that you can’t. However, as is the case with many of the IRA rules, there is an exception. We explain below.

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