… for your buy&hold stocks in your IRA.
Most stocks are quite a bit down, and your stocks that you plan to keep will go back up eventually.
Better for them to go up in a ROTH than in a taxable IRA.
Something to consider.
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I’ve been advising exactly that; as well as postponing any scheduled RMDs for those that had planned to take cash.
I’ve been advising exactly that; as well as postponing any scheduled RMDs for those that had planned to take cash.
Yeah, the bad thing is you have to take your RMD before you can do ROTH conversions.
… for your buy&hold stocks in your IRA.
Most stocks are quite a bit down, and your stocks that you plan to keep will go back up eventually.
Better for them to go up in a ROTH than in a taxable IRA.
Something to consider.
This might make sense if you are not yet subject to RMD withdrawals from your tax-deferred IRA. If you are subject to RMD withdrawals, it might not make sense as you must withdraw your RMD before doing a Roth conversion.
If the tax penalty is 41% of the amount being converted due to your spouse dying, you need roughly 20 years to recover the conversion cost. You’re likely to be better off forgetting the conversion and live it in your tax-deferred IRA.
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… for your buy&hold stocks in your IRA.
I did just that in March of 2020, and dawdled around last year waiting for the pullback that didn’t come in 2021. I converted a little in July and a little in November.
Trap to watch out for: If you are 63 or older, making your taxable income higher than $91,000 (single filer) or $182,000 (married filing jointly), could cause you to pay $170 more per month for Medicare. Yeah, weird that some calculations start at age 63. There are some higher breakpoints that increase Medicare even more, which you can look for using IRMAA as the search term.
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Yeah, weird that some calculations start at age 63. There are some higher breakpoints that increase Medicare even more, which you can look for using IRMAA as the search term.
Not weird at all. Medicare uses a 2-year lookback period, so since you sign up for Medicare at 65, they will look at your income from 2 years prior to that.
DH will be 65 in April, and so I have been managing our income for the last 2 years while doing Roth conversions to keep us below that threshold. I will continue to do that for the next few years to help with RMDs and when there is just one of us left and for when the kids inherit. Lots of moving parts here. But I do have a spreadsheet 
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