IRA MRD fees?

[explanade]

They asked me about my VG setup and said the fees they're paying are too much.

My mother chafes that her IRA balance is lower but she's also been getting MRDs for awhile now.

 

[pb4uski]

.... So in a standard IRA, when you take MRDs, does the custodian impose any kind of fees typically?

Not in my Mom's Vanguard IRA.

 

[pb4uski]

....I think if they want to withdraw some of it and move over to VG, it could be a taxable event.

What you can probably do, whether you transfer to Vanguard or whoever, is for tax-deferred accounts sell all, transfer the cash and then buy what you want in the new account.

For the taxable accounts (and likely the living trusts), you can probably transfer the assets "in kind" and will have the same portfolio but at a different firm and no taxable event. I suggest that you talk with the new provider in advance as there may be certain assets that cannot be transferred "in kind". For those, you can sell and tranfer cash if the tax impact of selling is benign, or leave thos assets at Fidelity and liquidate them over time to minimize the tax impact.

 

[rodi]

As has been pointed out - the issue isn't Fidelity... it's the FA that is using Fidelity. Fidelity doesn't charge fees on RMD distributions.... I suspect the FA does.

I agree with the other posters that you need clarity about the trusts... are these estate planning type living trusts? Or are your parents invested in trust investments? If it's the former, they should be transferable as long as the title is maintained correctly.

Talk to your parents about moving from their current FA to a Fidelity in-house managed portfolio... Much lower fees. Since Fidelity is already the custodian, I would imagine that the transfer would be fairly straightforward. The only issue might be the push back that the FA will give... (s)he'll try to convince your parents it's a bad move to leave him/her.

 

[haha]

Not in my Mom's Vanguard IRA.

Nor in my Fidelity IRA.