Why You Should Roll Your 401(k) to Your New Employer

September 19, 2016

When changing jobs, what should you do with your employer-sponsored retirement account balance? Our blog editor,  Erik Carter, JD, CFP®, recently wrote a post titled What Should You Do With That Old Retirement Plan, in which he stated that if he left an employer, he would be very likely to roll over his retirement account balance to an IRA in order to have access to more investment choices. Erik outlined a job-changing employee’s four options: 1) leave the money in the former employer’s plan, 2) cash out your account, 3) roll over your balance to a new employer or to an individual IRA or 4) purchase an immediate income annuity (if it’s a feature of your former plan.)

Option 3, rolling over your balance, is by far the preferable choice for the large majority of retirement savers. For most people, it may make more sense to roll their retirement plan balance to their new employer’s plan rather than an IRA. Here’s why:

Lower Fees

Many 401(k) plans offer participants access to institutional share class mutual funds and very low cost index funds, especially those sponsored by large employers. Conversely, investing in your IRA can get expensive if you aren’t careful to monitor the mutual fund fees, trading costs and account fees. Before you make your distribution decision, compare and contrast the fees for all your options, including leaving your account with your previous employer, rolling your balance to an IRA and rolling it to your new employer. Not sure which option offers you the lowest cost of investing, given the type of investments your want to choose? Use FINRA’s free mutual fund fee analyzer tool.

Keep it Simple

While it’s true that there is a broader universe of investment options in a self-directed IRA account at a brokerage firm or mutual fund company than in your workplace retirement plan, many investors don’t need or want that kind of customization in their investment strategy. Keeping your retirement plan balances in one place allows you to see at a glance the investment mix of your retirement savings and how much you’ve saved simply by logging on to one site. If you’re a more “hands-off” investor, a target date fund in your plan with a date near your target retirement can offer you an easy, diversified, one-stop-shopping investment strategy.

Protection Against Lawsuits

Balances in retirement plans, such as 401(ks), are protected against civil judgments and bankruptcy. (But if you owe taxes, your 401(k) assets can be seized to settle the tax debt – and you’ll have to pay more taxes and a 10% penalty if you take an early withdrawal to settle the bill.) The higher your income and/or net worth, the more important it is to consider this factor. However, depending on where you live, your state may not extend that protection to IRAs.

Borrowing Power

Many 401(k) plans permit participants to borrow from their plan assets at a very low rate of interest. If you roll your old plan into your new plan, you’ll have a bigger base of assets against which to borrow. (A common borrowing limit is 50% of your vested balance up to $50,000, but check with your plan administrator for the specifics of your plan.)

While the disadvantages usually outweigh the advantages in borrowing against your retirement plan, there are times when it may make sense, such as preventing eviction, foreclosure or auto repossession, paying off very high interest debt or putting 20% down on a home purchase to avoid PMI. Keep in mind that you’ll repay the loan with after-tax dollars so you’ll end up being double-taxed on the interest when you eventually withdraw it, and those funds won’t have access to market performance during the loan repayment period. Also, if you leave your company for any reason before the loan is repaid, your unpaid balance becomes a taxable retirement plan distribution, subject to a 10% penalty.

Workplace Financial Guidance

More and more companies are offering workplace financial wellness programs, where financial education and guidance are offered to employees as an employer-paid benefit. Can you attend a workshop or webcast, use an online learning resource or work one-on-one with a financial coach? More 401(k) plan sponsors also offer access to robo advice, where an online investment adviser service sets your investment mix based on your risk tolerance and time horizon and regularly re-balances your portfolio.

How about you? What do you think is a better idea: rolling an old retirement plan into an IRA or into your next employer’s plan? Email me at [email protected] or let me know on Twitter @cynthiameyer_FF.

 

 

What Should You Do With That Old Retirement Plan?

August 18, 2016

One of the questions I get from time to time on our financial helpline is what someone should do with their retirement plan when they leave a job. They often end up simply leaving the plan there, but that’s not always the best choice. Let’s look at the options:

Leave the money there. This is typically allowed as long as you have at least $5k in the plan. If you’re retired, you may be able to take periodic withdrawals. It’s the simplest choice because it requires no action from you.

Some good reasons to leave the money there are because you want to have access to a unique investment in the plan or you’d like to pay a lower tax on the appreciation of any employer stock in the plan when you eventually withdraw it. Otherwise, you’re probably better off rolling into another retirement plan to consolidate your accounts and provide you with more investment options. You’ll also have to take a required minimum distribution from each 401(k) and 403(b) you have at age 70 1/2 (unless you’re still working there).

Take the money and run. You can have them send you a check for the balance. However, you’ll have to pay taxes (plus potentially a 10% penalty if you’re under age 55 or if you’re under age 59 ½ and you left your employer before the year you turned 55) on it. If it’s a large enough distribution, that money could also put you in a higher tax bracket.

Roll it over. If you don’t want to leave the money behind or send a big check to Uncle Sam, rolling it into a new retirement account allows you to continue postponing the taxes on it. An IRA generally gives you more investment options while rolling it into your employer’s plan can allow you to consolidate your retirement accounts and possibly give you the option  of borrowing against it. If you change your mind, the money you roll into your employer’s plan can typically be rolled into an IRA and vice versa.

Turn it into guaranteed income. Some plans allow you to use your retirement plan balance to purchase an immediate income annuity at discounted rates (and hence you’d get higher payments) or even into a pension plan if you have one. This provides an income that you can’t outlive and avoids any early withdrawal penalties. The downside is that you generally give up the lump sum of money and should only be considered when you’re ready to retire.

Personally, I’d roll my 401(k) into my IRA if I were to leave Financial Finesse because I’d like to have more investment options. I also know people who prefer to keep things simple by rolling everything into their current employer’s plan. If you’re still not sure what to do, consider speaking to an unbiased financial professional.

 

3 Reasons To Make After-Tax Contributions To Your Retirement Plan

April 25, 2016

Updated for current tax figures

Are you lucky enough to have the option to save after-tax money in your employer’s retirement plan? Most employees probably haven’t given it a thought, and not many utilize the option to save more than the current $18,500 pre-tax annual employee contribution limit (plus another $6,000 if you are 50 and older).

In fact, many people are not even aware that they may be able to save additional money in their employer-sponsored retirement plan, in some cases up to the annual total defined contribution limit (from both employee and employer) of $55,000 (plus $6,000 catch up if 50 and older) or 100% of your compensation, whichever is less. Sure, the likelihood of saving that much for many people might be small.

However, if you are already contributing the maximum in pre-tax and Roth contributions, here are some reasons to save more after-tax:

Automatic savings

Saving for an early retirement or financial independence? Let’s face it. It’s unlikely you’d save that much or invest on such a consistent schedule if you had to write a check every two weeks to a mutual fund company.

That’s one reason your employer can be your best financial services provider. Saving after-tax money in your retirement plan can be as easy as clicking a button or signing a form to choose what percentage of your salary you want to save. Every paycheck, you’ll defer money into after-tax savings and invest them in plan funds, just like your regular contributions. Little by little, you’ll save and grow that extra money without having to think about it.

Ability to withdraw contributions

You should generally be able to withdraw after-tax voluntary contributions, subject to the plan guidelines on withdrawals, even before you’re 59 1/2 and without meeting a specific need like you often do for a hardship withdrawal. That means if you have an emergency, you will be able to access those funds.

However, you may not be able to withdraw associated earnings growth, and if you are, those earnings – but not your original contributions – would be subject to taxes and a 10% penalty if withdrawn prior to age 59 1/2.

Tax-free rollover to a Roth IRA

You’ll reap the biggest rewards from your after-tax contributions when you leave your company or retire. Assuming you’ve been saving for a while, your after-tax balance will contain two components: your original after tax contributions and the tax-deferred earnings growth on those contributions. The IRS allows you to separate those two components out during the rollover process, so you can do a direct rollover into multiple destinations: rolling the tax-deferred earnings growth into a traditional IRA and rolling your after-tax contributions into a Roth IRA.

That’s right. You read that correctly. Your after-tax voluntary contributions can be rolled into a Roth IRA, where any future earnings growth will then be tax-free (assuming you leave the money in the Roth for at least five years and until after age 59 ½ ). You may even be able to convert your after-tax contributions immediately to Roth and have all future growth tax-free (but then you give up the ability to withdraw it early).

Here’s an example: Jane is already contributing the maximum $18,500/year to her pre-tax 401(k) plan at XYZ Company. She wants to save extra for retirement, so she saves an additional $10,000 annually in after-tax voluntary contributions in the plan.

After 10 years, Jane has about $144,000 from her after-tax contributions ($100,000 in contributions and $44,000 in growth). She also has about $260,000 in pre-tax savings and growth from contributing the maximum. When she leaves XYZ to take a new job, she can roll her plan balances into multiple destinations: $100,000 into a Roth IRA and $304,000 into a traditional IRA or her new employer’s 401(k) plan.

Fast forward another 15 years to when Jane retires. Without adding any more money to her Roth IRA and receiving a 7% return, her account is now worth about $285,000. That’s an additional $185,000 of tax-free growth, all because she originally saved after-tax money in her 401(k) plan.

 

 

Should You Take a Pension or a Lump Sum?

December 05, 2014

Within the past few weeks, I have had more than a few people ask about a prior employer offering a lump sum payout vs. leaving it in the plan and taking a monthly payout at a later date.I’m not sure if companies are making this “the lump sum season” intentionally or not, but there has been a major influx of conversations about this topic. I’m figuring for every person that is asking, there are probably many more sitting there silently and trying to make the decision on their own.  That sounds like a great reason to write a blog post.  Here is the process that I walk through with a person to help them evaluate their options when they have a lump sum opportunity. Continue reading “Should You Take a Pension or a Lump Sum?”