Question on making transfer to Roth

[Badger]

Which would be better? We are in a 15% bracket now using wife’s small pension, her SS, dividends/interest, and cash. We have enough in IRA/403b to raise us to the 25% bracket in a few short years when RMD kicks in. Which would be the best path to minimize taxes? Which as the least impact on SS?

• Start receiving my SS then do a Roth IRA transfer up to the 15% bracket ceiling with the tIRA accounts and use cash to pay taxes.
• Same as “A” but transfer up to the 25% bracket ceiling as much as possible.
• Delay receiving my SS but do a Roth IRA transfer up to the 15% bracket ceiling with the tIRA accounts and use cash to pay taxes
• Same as “C” but transfer to the 25% bracket ceiling as much as possible.

I was thinking “D” but I really don’t have a clue. I hate to think that if I took SS now instead of waiting it would just be eaten up with tax. It seems like all the years of living on a very frugal, tight, shoestring budget and maxing out our 403b and Roth IRAs every year paid off to get to retirement but I can’t help but think there may have been a better way. Now I am trying to figure out the best plan so we can finally enjoy what we saved.

Could there be a plan “E”?

Cheers!

 

[RunningBum]

I don't really know the factors for the SS now or later for you, so I can't really say whether the question is between A and B, or C and D. Personally I like deferring SS as long as a can as longevity insurance, and since you seem to be leaning that way with D as well, let's say it's between C and D.

I would make sure you fill up the 15% bracket every year, so certainly do at least C. You don't want to do a lot of conversion in the 25% bracket with D only later to find in later years that you are leaving room under the 15% ceiling.

If you think you will always be into the 25% bracket, I don't think it matters too much unless you want to predict tax rates in the future.

I would caution you not to poke just into the 25% bracket with income + dividends + cap gains (minus deductions, etc). There is a window of conversion where you are paying 15% on each Roth conversion and pushing some dividends or cap gains into 15% taxation, for an effective 30% marginal rate. Once your income alone (minus deductions, etc) hits the 15% ceiling, all divs and CGs are now taxed at 15% and each Roth conversion dollar has a 25% marginal rate. So, the plan E you are looking for might be to do C and D in alternating years. You might further optimize this by loading up deductions in D years.

 

[pb4uski]

My plan would be C. If you do C between now and age 70 will RMDs still push you into the 25% bracket?

 

[Koolau]

There are folks on this forum (I'm not one of them) who would be able to use Turbo Tax or similar software to calculate (for themselves, of course) what would be the best path to take. In the absence of that ability, one might consider buying a couple of hours with a "tax guy" to do the required "what ifs" and (in effect) "tax plan" for the future. "Tax guys" could cost $200/hr or more, so you would want to have all the data ready and let him/her know what it is you wish to accomplish.

Then, understand that the tax laws will most likely change within the next couple of years. At least the overall "direction" of the tax laws should not come as a surprise. No matter how the "tax the rich" mantra was used to get where we are now, it's clear that balancing the budget (or even getting close) means that the middle class taxes will have to be "enhanced". YMMV

 

[FinancialDave]

I would not (and am not) planning to take SS at least before full retirement age, especially if you were the larger wage earner. You need to get that income up for a much better survivor benefit should something happen to you. If you can wait until 70, so much the better.

If you are in retirement, there is really not much point in worrying about doing a Roth Conversion. The time to have managed this was years ago when you needed to be doing equal amounts in Roth and non-Roth investments. Just use your current lower tax bracket to get a little extra out of your IRA if you can and build up your "qualified" dividend payers in your taxable account.

If you have a large bond position, make sure it is in your IRA account and not in your taxable account -- when bonds drop later, the taxman will pay part of your loss -- ugh! Better than you taking all the hit.

Though I don't know how much money your have in the 457b, I think you may be overly concerned with it's affect on your taxes. If you have millions in there then you really aren't going to be overly concerned with the taxes. If you don't have at least a million in IRA's then the taxes are not going to bother you that much.

fd

 

[Badger]

My plan would be C. If you do C between now and age 70 will RMDs still push you into the 25% bracket?

With all income sources considered I'm pretty sure we will be in the 25% bracket once we have to start RMDs. My wife will start first in 2 years and then me a year later.

Cheers!

 

[Badger]

... one might consider buying a couple of hours with a "tax guy" to do the required "what ifs" and (in effect) "tax plan" for the future. "Tax guys" could cost $200/hr or more, so you would want to have all the data ready and let him/her know what it is you wish to accomplish.

I have never used a service of this kind before and always tried to take care of us since most of the time it was pretty simple - work, save, be frugal, fill out short tax forms since no deductions.

I don't have a clue as to how to find a "tax guy" for my needs. Is there a specific title? What kind of certifications? I'm sure it couldn't be just any kind of accountant. It would be nice to have a relatively consistant plan for future years (understanding there will be changes in tax laws) if anything were to happen to me first.

Cheers!

Cheers!

 

[grasshopper]

I take it that you are 65+ and will not have to be concerned about income taking you over the HC mandate magic numbers.

 

[MichaelB]

My plan would be C. If you do C between now and age 70 will RMDs still push you into the 25% bracket?

+1. I admit to a favorable predisposition to ROTH.

I don't have a clue as to how to find a "tax guy" for my needs. Is there a specific title? What kind of certifications? I'm sure it couldn't be just any kind of accountant. It would be nice to have a relatively consistant plan for future years (understanding there will be changes in tax laws) if anything were to happen to me first.

The desktop version of tax SW, such as TurboTax or H&R Block, would let you do some simulations and see how different approaches impact you.

 

[FinancialDave]

With all income sources considered I'm pretty sure we will be in the 25% bracket once we have to start RMDs. My wife will start first in 2 years and then me a year later.

Cheers!

Have you considered that there is NO way to tell what income bracket you will be in 5 years into the future, unless of course you can foretell what Congress might do to the existing tax structure.

Let alone the problem is not just to age 70, it is possibly 20+ years beyond that. That is why I suggest not making any rash decisions based on what you perceive about the future. Sure if you have no Roth accounts at all you might convert some small amounts, if you can stay in the 15% bracket. Just remember the result of doing this is you are going to "burn" through your "taxable" accounts now rather than later, which will most likely put you in an even higher tax burden later.

The reason for the above is the following:

To remove $50,000 from your IRA you have to drain your taxable account by $7500 to pay the taxes. However, how much has this reduction in IRA by $50k really helped you. By the end of your 5th year of taking RMD's (which is maybe 7+ years from now) the rate of withdrawal is still just 4.2% - so 4.2% of that $50k is just $2,100 of reduced taxable income for you - and a reduction of taxable income of $2,100 even at 25% tax rate is only an extra $525 in tax. This is not by any means a complete analysis, because there really is no way to predict if your investments in the Roth will even make money over the short time frame they are in there. If they don't then it would have been better to keep them in the IRA.

So look at the question this way -- are you really willing to spend $7500 now, to avoid say $2500 ($500 per yr for 5 years) in taxes over the first 5 years of your RMD's.

 

[RunningBum]

I don't follow this post at all.

Have you considered that there is NO way to tell what income bracket you will be in 5 years into the future, unless of course you can foretell what Congress might do to the existing tax structure.

OK, I get this, but most people would guess that taxes won't get lower, so paying in a lower or even equal tax bracket now to what you are looking at in retirement seems like a reasonable bet. Just because you can't be sure about doesn't mean you shouldn't make your best prediction and act accordingly.

Let alone the problem is not just to age 70, it is possibly 20+ years beyond that. That is why I suggest not making any rash decisions based on what you perceive about the future. Sure if you have no Roth accounts at all you might convert some small amounts, if you can stay in the 15% bracket. Just remember the result of doing this is you are going to "burn" through your "taxable" accounts now rather than later, which will most likely put you in an even higher tax burden later.

How would putting money in a Roth, where it will never be taxed again, give you a higher tax burden later? Your example below doesn't show this.

The reason for the above is the following:

To remove $50,000 from your IRA you have to drain your taxable account by $7500 to pay the taxes. However, how much has this reduction in IRA by $50k really helped you. By the end of your 5th year of taking RMD's (which is maybe 7+ years from now) the rate of withdrawal is still just 4.2% - so 4.2% of that $50k is just $2,100 of reduced taxable income for you - and a reduction of taxable income of $2,100 even at 25% tax rate is only an extra $525 in tax. This is not by any means a complete analysis, because there really is no way to predict if your investments in the Roth will even make money over the short time frame they are in there. If they don't then it would have been better to keep them in the IRA.

So look at the question this way -- are you really willing to spend $7500 now, to avoid say $2500 ($500 per yr for 5 years) in taxes over the first 5 years of your RMD's.

Comparing the tax of a full conversion to the tax on RMDs for just 5 years is apples to oranges. After those 5 years of RMDs you're still left with about 80% of your traditional IRA to be taxed, but you've already paid 33% of the taxes that you could've paid earlier with the Roth conversion.

 

[Koolau]

Have you considered that there is NO way to tell what income bracket you will be in 5 years into the future, unless of course you can foretell what Congress might do to the existing tax structure.

Let alone the problem is not just to age 70, it is possibly 20+ years beyond that. That is why I suggest not making any rash decisions based on what you perceive about the future. Sure if you have no Roth accounts at all you might convert some small amounts, if you can stay in the 15% bracket. Just remember the result of doing this is you are going to "burn" through your "taxable" accounts now rather than later, which will most likely put you in an even higher tax burden later.

The reason for the above is the following:

To remove $50,000 from your IRA you have to drain your taxable account by $7500 to pay the taxes. However, how much has this reduction in IRA by $50k really helped you. By the end of your 5th year of taking RMD's (which is maybe 7+ years from now) the rate of withdrawal is still just 4.2% - so 4.2% of that $50k is just $2,100 of reduced taxable income for you - and a reduction of taxable income of $2,100 even at 25% tax rate is only an extra $525 in tax. This is not by any means a complete analysis, because there really is no way to predict if your investments in the Roth will even make money over the short time frame they are in there. If they don't then it would have been better to keep them in the IRA.

So look at the question this way -- are you really willing to spend $7500 now, to avoid say $2500 ($500 per yr for 5 years) in taxes over the first 5 years of your RMD's.

I agree that there is NO way to know what bracket one will be in in the future. If things stayed the same (no significant tax-law changes) one could just about estimate the bracket. But, since we all know that tax laws change almost daily, you are correct, F-Dave. BUT who among us thinks taxes will go down for us "rich folks" (You know - the middle class who actually have most of the money 'cause there are so many of us?) Based on that, my plan has been to pay at least some of the taxes now and lower my liability for later. We'll see if I'm right.

Regarding your point about using after tax money to pay taxes: That's the ideal, because it effectively gives you a "larger" Roth than you originally had as a tIRA. But, if you need to pay the taxes using more tIRA money, you still accomplish the (my) goal of reducing future RMDs. Just stay within your chosen tax bracket for the total. In the unlikely event that tax rates go down or brackets go up, you loose. This is a bit like counting cards at black jack. It can work in theory 'cause you know how the house plays the game. (In this case you "know" that the gummint (D or R) needs more money to buy more votes. So, you "know" that taxes will go up in the future.) Naturally, paying "early" isn't for everyone as YMMV.

 

[DeborahB]

I can't speak to the "best" way for you. It's something to work out with spreadsheets and software and maybe a CPA (wait until tax season is over if you can). Here's what I did, though.

I took SS in Jan 2011 at age 62 1/2 (so it didn't have an impact on 2010 income when I was still working.) I was not comfortable cashing in investments to live on. The math of it became irrelevant. I felt better getting an income stream.

I have been converting IRA $ to ROTH IRAs as I am able to, to increase the amount of non-taxable income I have without killing myself with taxes. I am not withdrawing $ from the Roth or IRA yet. I tend to put either losers in the ROTH - stocks I think will appreciate and will have the gain not taxed - or high yielding dividend payers, to make the future dividends untaxable. I'm in a low income bracket (not sure what right now) so I play with scenarios in TurboTax to see where the break points are where my income gets taxed too much (this is for deciding what to convert to a Roth).

There's no way to know what the taxes will be like in the future - I just hope my strategy pays off in some way. If the situation changes, my strategy will change. YMMV

 

[kaneohe]

Agree w/ runningbum in everything he's said above esp if comparing 15% now
vs 25% later. ........and make sure you verify w/ tax software/calculator before doing anything. It's easy to have the wrong idea about how things work w/ QDIV/LTCG and fall into the 30% bracket trap that RB mentioned.

 

[FinancialDave]

BUT who among us thinks taxes will go down for us "rich folks" (You know - the middle class who actually have most of the money 'cause there are so many of us?) Based on that, my plan has been to pay at least some of the taxes now and lower my liability for later. We'll see if I'm right.

Regarding your point about using after tax money to pay taxes: That's the ideal, because it effectively gives you a "larger" Roth than you originally had as a tIRA. But, if you need to pay the taxes using more tIRA money, you still accomplish the (my) goal of reducing future RMDs. Just stay within your chosen tax bracket for the total. In the unlikely event that tax rates go down or brackets go up, you loose. This is a bit like counting cards at black jack. It can work in theory 'cause you know how the house plays the game. (In this case you "know" that the gummint (D or R) needs more money to buy more votes. So, you "know" that taxes will go up in the future.) Naturally, paying "early" isn't for everyone as YMMV.

Listen, planning for retirement is nothing like counting cards at a black-jack table. If you don't wait until you are 5 years from retirement to develop a strategy, you have all kinds of ways to adjust your tax bracket. If however you are sitting at home with all your money in tax-deferred IRA and looking to retire in 5 years, you are going to most likely "waste" a LOT of money because now you have finally decided that the best way to pay no taxes later is to pay them all now.

All I'm trying to say to anyone still under 50 is that it doesn't have to be that way. I retired at 60, have sizable amounts in both Roth and non-Roth buckets and I can adjust my tax rate anywhere from ZERO to probably 33% (if I wanted to.) At tax rates of 0 to 15%, which is very easy to do with taxable income all the way up to $93K, that money that I put in the IRA over the last 25 years at tax rates between 20 to 30% is looking quite valuable right now -- I am sure glad it is not all in a Roth account, because the Roth money will actually be more expensive, when I use it and my tax rates are lower.

The reason being for a married couple (2013,one spouse over 65) your first $21k or so is tax free, due to deductions and exemptions. The next $17,850 is taxed at 10%, next $54650 up to $72.5k is taxed at 15%. What that means is that if all my income was coming out of the IRA the first $93,000 is coming out at an effective tax rate of about 10%, while at least for me I know it went in at a marginal rate of over 20%, some earlier years when tax rates were higher, closer to 25% or 30%. So I saved quite a bit putting the money in the IRA and taking it out at much lower tax rates now!

This is however a very complex tax worksheet to figure out, and I just get concerned when I see people talk like they know what their tax rate is going to be over the next 30 years and that scares them into doing something dumb, just to say they will have very little taxes to pay.

fd

 

[RunningBum]

Guess what, FDave? You and the people under 50 you are talking about have or will be making decisions based on guesses on what the tax rates would be or will be in the future, the same thing you are chastising the OP for.

While it would've been better to ask these questions 20 years ago, the OP can't do that. He's trying to figure out what's best to do in the only time period he has some control over, the present and the future. He may not be able to make a huge impact at this point, but it's never too late to do something. Besides, there's no indication that they did anything at all wrong in the past.

Badger, if you still have questions, it would probably be best to talk in real numbers. How much is in your tIRA? How much under the 15% ceiling are you now, and where would you be in retirement not counting RMDs.

 

[Koolau]

Listen, planning for retirement is nothing like counting cards at a black-jack table. If you don't wait until you are 5 years from retirement to develop a strategy, you have all kinds of ways to adjust your tax bracket. If however you are sitting at home with all your money in tax-deferred IRA and looking to retire in 5 years, you are going to most likely "waste" a LOT of money because now you have finally decided that the best way to pay no taxes later is to pay them all now.

All I'm trying to say to anyone still under 50 is that it doesn't have to be that way. I retired at 60, have sizable amounts in both Roth and non-Roth buckets and I can adjust my tax rate anywhere from ZERO to probably 33% (if I wanted to.) At tax rates of 0 to 15%, which is very easy to do with taxable income all the way up to $93K, that money that I put in the IRA over the last 25 years at tax rates between 20 to 30% is looking quite valuable right now -- I am sure glad it is not all in a Roth account, because the Roth money will actually be more expensive, when I use it and my tax rates are lower.

The reason being for a married couple (2013,one spouse over 65) your first $21k or so is tax free, due to deductions and exemptions. The next $17,850 is taxed at 10%, next $54650 up to $72.5k is taxed at 15%. What that means is that if all my income was coming out of the IRA the first $93,000 is coming out at an effective tax rate of about 10%, while at least for me I know it went in at a marginal rate of over 20%, some earlier years when tax rates were higher, closer to 25% or 30%. So I saved quite a bit putting the money in the IRA and taking it out at much lower tax rates now!

This is however a very complex tax worksheet to figure out, and I just get concerned when I see people talk like they know what their tax rate is going to be over the next 30 years and that scares them into doing something dumb, just to say they will have very little taxes to pay.

fd

F-Dave, you get no argument from me that folks should be careful about putting too much into tax deferred vehicles. I've been saying that for years (since, unfortunately, that's exactly what I did!) YMMV

 

[FinancialDave]

Bum,
Certainly real numbers will always help, as I have certainly done a lot of math over the years.

If it wasn't clear before, let me say it straight out. I am NOT advocating making decisions based on guesses on what tax rates will be, as this is strictly a game for fortune tellers. What I am advocating is a strategy that will work in any tax environment - in effect being able to adjust your tax rate in retirement to ANYTHING you want - beyond of course whatever taxable fixed income you receive from Pensions, SS, or taxable account, all of which need to be considered.

The problem with trying to do the above in the short term is much the same problem that someone runs into when trying to decide if he/she should put short term money in a savings account or an investment. Most of the "informed" will probably tell you that you should not make investments with a time horizon of less than 5 years, however, what we have also learned from the so called recent "lost decade" of market returns is that even 5 years can be too short. So where the above OP is concerned, making small conversions in a number of years is a much better strategy, to at least get some Roth money (dollar cost averaging in effect,) than trying to do it all in 2 or 3 years.

What I have learned in doing this for over 30 years, and reading a lot of literature on the subject and reviewing a number of different accounts, my own included, is that the literature is very true when it states that "most" people do not even come close to getting market returns over their lifetime. Most of the literature equates this to too frequent trading in the account, but let me offer another personal viewpoint, that could be observed if you understand a particular investment statistic called "turnover ratio," which is similar to what might be called the "churn" of your account - how often you buy or sell investments. If you look at a whole series of index funds, both ETF or mutual fund, you will see the turnover ratio usually in the range of single digits and in fact they capture the market returns very well. Compare that to actively managed funds with a turnover ratio 3-10 times that and note that only about 25% of them capture the market returns. I am not saying this is the only cause, but it certainly doesn't help to be "churning" your account based on some future thoughts or predictions. What I will add to this is buying and selling your investments is not the only kind of churn that can affect your account, changing the tax structure of your investments over a short time frame is also a form of "churn" IMHO. So if it can be avoided, at least to the end of not creating double digit turnover ratios in your account, I believe your returns will improve as well. If it can't then maybe a better choice for the OP is to just sell some of the tIRA and put it in the taxable account - in this way if the market turns down when they need the money it is a win-win (relatively speaking that is - no one wants loses.)

fd