The Benefits of a Roth IRA

This first hour starts off with a discussion about the cost of healthcare in retirement. Understand the importance of long-term care and the fees associated with it. Joe and Al discuss the value in Roth IRAs and explain why it is one of the best gifts the IRS has given us. Find out if you should utilize Roth conversions and what Roth IRA limits you should be aware of. The two finish off the hour by discussing backdoor Roth IRAs and investment strategies for retirees.

2:15 “Another story USA Today ran is that 7 out of 10 people in the country over the age of 65 will need some form of long term care”

7:34 “If you’re at least 62 years old and you and your spouse have not started taking your benefits, you can miss out on tens of thousands of dollars of benefits if you don’t take action”

8:47 “The end of the year is very important when it comes to tax planning because I would say about 99% of the tax strategies that are available have to be done between now and year-end”

14:19 “Here’s a way for you to start taking some money off the table and get it into a Roth IRA while you’re in a low tax bracket so that when you are 70 or 70 ½, you’re not in these higher tax brackets. You would mitigate future taxes right now”

17:03 “If you can take some of the money out of the IRA before your tax rate goes up, that is a really good thing because the truth is taxes don’t stop when your paycheck does”

19:29 “The difference between your IRA and a Roth IRA is that the IRA will grow tax-deferred but when you pull the money out it’s taxable at ordinary income rates. When the money is in a Roth, it will grow 100% tax-deferred but then when you the money out of the Roth, it is tax-free”

21:09 “If you have a 401(k) or employer-sponsored plan, you can still contribute to a Roth IRA as long as your AGI is below those thresholds”

23:35 “Put money into an IRA, it’s an after-tax contribution, take that after-tax contribution and you can convert that directly into a Roth. It’s a loophole in the tax code. For a lot of high income wage earners, this is a way to get your money into a Roth. You have until April 15^th to do the IRA contribution”

26:55 “You have more control over your taxes in retirement than any other time in your life”

33:10 “Saving money and spending money are two different things because when volatile markets hit and you’re taking distributions from your account, it can decimate the overall retirement”

35:35 “Our philosophy is once you hit retirement or get close to retirement, you want to have a boring strategy. You want to make sure that the money is there for you, that you can create a retirement income, you take a little bit of risk but in most cases you preserve the capital that you have”