Calculating RMDs

[jIMOh]

I have a question-

How are RMDs calculated if one spouse is over age 70.5 and one spouse is under 70.5?
If both are over 70.5, does the calculation change?
Anyone do anything special in situations where one spouse is 73 and the other is 68 to prevent RMDs from depleting assets too soon?

Thx.

Links to IRS pubs or calculators appreciated!

Thx again.

 

[rescueme]

IRA's are not joint in nature (even though we may combine them here, for discussion).

Your RMD is calculated on your holdings; DW does the same on hers, against your respective portfolio's, and age.

Most, if not all companies will calculate your RMD and do the automatic withdrawl for you at year-end (along with taxes due), and most have an RMD tool on their site to give you a heads up on what will be required according to your indivudial age and holdings, based upon your current situation.

Here's VG's:

https://personal.vanguard.com/us/insights/retirement/estimate-your-rmd-tool

and FIDO's:

https://web.fidelity.com/mrd/application/MRDCalculator

As far as your comment on depleting assets, it's not a problem. Just because you are required to start taking withdrawls (and pay taxes) dosen't mean you have to spend the money. You are free to reinvest your "excess RMD's" (e.g. the funds you need to withdraw due to IRS/govenrment rules, beyond what you need to actually spend) and just continue in your normal fashon of investing. However, now you need to consider gains and losses (which I won't go into here).

Heck, if you don't want to bother with reinvestment of excess RMD's, just park them in a CD, if you wish...

 

[jebmke]

I find that it helps to remember that a portion of your IRA is owned by the IRS and the act of taking a distribution is merely dividing up that piece into YOUR part and the part already owned by the IRS. So when I look at my total holdings, I deduct an estimate of the amount that is owned by the IRS when I want to know what my total value is. ie., if the IRA value is $100,000 and my tax rate is 25%, $75K is mine and $25K is Sam's.