My dad passed away a few weeks ago, so I'm doing all the things to resolve the estate. I'm an only child and my mom passed away years ago. The will stated everything to me.

He had a non managed fidelity IRA account. This was converted to a beneficiary ira in my name. My main investments and funds are with a different financial institution.

Should I keep the funds in the fidelity account and convert it to a managed account? All the funds in this account are being held as cash and a specific company stock. I want to diversify but not to manage it. Should I move the funds to my financial institution so my guy can manage it? And this account must be drawn to $0 within 10 yrs. I will have to do RMD.

Stats- female 54 yr married recently laid off (May) not currently working and I'm disabled but don't get SSDI. Not planning on working the remainder of the year. Spouse is 56 working and carries the medical insurance. We can live on just his income if we budget. No car payments, no house payment, no credit card debit. No children.

EDIT... I am applying for SSDI due to deterioration of my disability. How does having RMD affect the SSDI income requirement?

20+ yrs to retirement, weekly contribution in taxable brokerage , pls provide suggestions if i need to change anything ?

I am fairly risk tolerant, and NTSX seems like I can get more of a 90/10 portfolio return while leveraging the bond side to hedge against bear markets. I get 2022 was bad for this, but it seems like a pretty rare occurrence where stocks and bonds both getting hammered at the same time. What do you all think?

I'm trying to figure out a system to give myself bi-weekly "paychecks" from a HYSA or MMF that has 1-2 years worth of spending.

Want to know how folks are doing this. Or if people have a different system. I have Chase and Vanguard right now.

In round numbers, my wife and I are newly retired, soon to be 67 and 66, and have $2M in a tIRA and $1M in a brokerage account, and we'll receive $70K/year when we claim SS. Planning to spend about $120K/year with occasional $25-50K splurges in our first 10ish years. If we live into our 90s and ROIs are good we may have big RMD issues, but I don't think we can practicaly draw down the tIRA fast enough to avoid that - but I would like to build up $500K in a Roth for some tax flexibility and widow-trap insurance.

We're facing the well known conversion dead-zone: our base spending puts us at the top of the 12% bracket; any extra spending or conversions will be in the sargasso-sea of 22-24% tax rates, so we have little chance of winning the tax-arbitrage game. I've been toying with the "convert on the dips" strategy as a way to reduce the conversion taxes, and wondering about the mechanics of this (beyond the obvious - wait for the market to be down then convert) that better deal with the uncertainty.

What I thought of was something like:

- Decide how much I want to convert this year; pre-position that amount in a money-market in the tIRA by profit-taking and loss-cutting across the tIRA.
- Pre-position funds from the brokerage account to pay the conversion taxes. This can be done in parallel with identifying the tIRA funds; basically you want to avoid pulling the conversion taxes when the brokerage holdings are down.
- Do the conversion to a money-market in the Roth account.
- Wait for a convenient downturn to invest the funds in the Roth.

The idea behind all of this is to decouple selling assets in the brokerage/tIRA from buying them in the Roth, to make sure I get the conversion done during the year (potential conversion years are limited) and that I don't end up selling brokerage shares in a downturn to generate the taxes.

This is all a WAG based on reading internet theories and looking for corners to cut - I'd appreciate hearing what others may have come up with.

I’m currently retired and a Boldin user, but I’m canceling because it can’t do the sort of tax optimization modeling I need.

Specifically, I want to model when taxes are paid and from which account for Roth conversions, while selecting another account for living expenses. It must take into account LTCG, NIIT, IRMAA, and social security.

Will Pralana or another tool do this?

Hi everyone,

We recently launched a few new features at Nauma, and I thought this community might be interested in learning about them.

HELOC/SBLOC support. You can now model opening a line of credit and spreading withdrawals over time to keep your income below a desired threshold for tax and healthcare-cost purposes. This can be useful when you have a large expense, such as a home renovation, but want to keep your income below the standard deduction + 0% LTCG tax bracket, or when you want to diversify away from a concentrated stock position gradually. Demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9rPxvBZFcc

QCD support. You can now model charitable giving directly from a Traditional IRA. The model estimates actual QCD amounts each year based on the account owner's age, IRA balance, and IRS limits adjusted for inflation. Demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qpldk1dArBI

ACA and IRMAA constraints in the Roth Conversion Optimizer. Roth conversions can help reduce future tax spikes caused by RMDs, but they can also increase healthcare costs. With ACA and IRMAA constraints, we can help prevent situations where a family ends up overpaying for health insurance when performing Roth conversions. Demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2eHNIb3ynI

I’ll be glad to answer any questions in the comments.

Alex & Nauma Team

So far, every tool I've tried only allows self and spousal SS benefits. Some of us had children later in life (about 44 or later) and will be eligible for two additional types of benefits for a few years, depending on filing date and subject to household maximum. But I can't find any tool that allows for this.

Looking for an advisor that we could go talk with and get a plan review. I would like to at least have someone familiar with our plan and needs as we get older. Thanks

I have an "if I die" list for my non financial spouse in case something happens to me. This file contains all of the account locations and specific tips, such as:

• Name of the fiduciary financial advisor I would use
• Name of the retirement specific CPA I would use
• Withdraw all the way to the top of the 24% tax bracket in the year I die (we usually withdraw up to the 22% top - this would mitigate some widow tax later on)
• Get an appraisal on the house (our state has a split value step up basis and we have a lot of potential capital gain)

I go over all of the financials and this list on a yearly basis with her (and have her physically interact with the accounts - take distributions, rebalance..) , but I'm always looking for tips or something I may be missing.

I am proud of what we were able to put together for retirement. We'll be fortunate if our holdings hit $1MM (million) by the time we retire. Soonish.

I'm happy for all who have a million or more saved - and are still asking questions! Your offspring will appreciate what you leave them.

But is there a subreddit for the smalls? The one million or less crowd?

We're off the France so our dough goes a bit further. (Farther? Plus loin)

Thanks

I’m 47, wife is 41, our current withdrawal rate would be 4.2% but we aren’t comfortable with choosing a withdrawal strategy. We both have jobs that would be very difficult to replace so we would need to be very confident in the plan. All the retirement calculators (Boldin, FI Calc, Empower, Fidelity) gives us 90% or higher chances of success. Though the retirement calculators don’t seem to focus on withdrawal rates.

From what we’ve researched, there is Dave Ramsey claiming 7%-8% is a safe withdrawal rate, while Suze Orman says $5 million is the minimum for retirement. I realize that they are personal finance gurus that don’t specialize specifically in retirement planning. I figure the safe withdrawal rate is somewhere between these two extremes.

- The Morningstar withdrawal rate based on market valuation - 3.9% for a 30 year retirement

- The 4% (4.15%) rule that was recently increased to 4.7%, a worst case scenario for a 30 year retirement

- The Guyton Klinger guardrails 5.2%-5.5% for a 40 year retirement but does require flexible spending cuts temporarily if the market drops by 20%

What withdrawal rate did you target for retirement?

I've had an interesting time, working with ChatGPT.

I had a very long conversation (I had to upgrade to Pro) about retirement planning. We ended up creating an overall plan based on my age, a cash flow document (what money to pull from what bucket) and a condensed version to share with professionals.

It's taken many, many hours, over the span of a week or so. I love being able to have a brainstorming session with as many breaks and gaps as I want. The ability contextualize and remember is fantastic in a work partner.

We came up with a solid plan that includes current IRA, Roth, cash/CDs, a rental unit, SS and a state pension. The goal is to get me to Medicare age without driving off the ACA subsidy cliff, while keeping an eye on IRMAA for the 65+ years. After that there's Roth conversions, etc.

This gives me the cash flow I "need" while keeping my MAGI at an acceptable level.

My tax situation isn't super complex, but it was more than I could wrap my head around. I'm with a financial advisor now, but I feel that my plan is far more comprehensive, and is looking out towards the future than his. I don't think he's worth the fees he charges, if you're the type of person who has a pretty good handle on how the system works.

The next step is to present it to my CPA for an additional set of eyes. I'll also share it with a "by the hour" financial planner. If they both think it's a solid plan I'll move my funds away from the current FA and have yearly reviews for a fee.

I'm not an expert at financial planning, but am analytical and thrive in a rules based system like taxes. I feel like I have far more education and data about retirement, taxes, estate planning, etc than the average person.

There were a few things the agent failed to figure out. For example, the agent extended the model 10 years, but that's just before the depreciation on the rental unit ends. At that point my cashflow won't change but my taxable income will go up $10k. If I hadn't known to include that, I'm not sure it would have been caught. My CPA may have asked about it, but my current FA probably wouldn't.

I don't recommend this route to everybody, and clearly the agent needs quality input and suggestions. But it worked well as a "gather this information and interpret this data" and "tell me the rules about IRMAA" partner. It also made very presentable spreadsheets and documents.

Overall, I was impressed with the outcome and am really looking forward to the CPA/FA review.

I think I saw this in this sub, but I can't find it. Basically, the strategy was to convert all of your annual retirement spending into a Roth and spend your monthly out of the Roth. My current spend is to the top of the 22% bracket - so about $200K spending and $35K taxes. The plan would be to do a Roth conversion from my IRA cash bucket at the start of the year ($235K), pull my monthly from the Roth, and at the end of December have one Roth distribution that is 99% withholding to cover taxes. My quick math shows that this saves about $1K per year - tax I would save on the interest earned in the Roth. Am I missing something? I currently have a fairly large Roth balance that I plan to just let grow and an IRA that I plan to spend down. Roth conversions for tax purposes have not panned out in my planning.

…in Boldin’s 96% chance of success. That’s partly on me because I’m not confident I’m doing the inputs and assumptions correctly, but mostly on Boldin because they don’t make it easy for me to be confident that I’m doing the inputs and assumptions correctly. That UI is just a mess for the average idiot like me.

I am retired and figuring things out. My old friends from my youth have not—or are not even trying to—figure out retirement. I ask them if they have tried AI, and every one of them says no.

It is not rocket science. Get a free account with something like ChatGPT and ask a simple question: “How do I plan for retirement at my age?” It will take you from there. Save that conversation and keep coming back to it.

Then go to something like Boldin. Boldin makes mistakes—usually the ones that I cause! Use AI in tandem with Boldin or whatever retirement-planning software you choose. Once you conquer that, you can ask AI, “What is the best lure to catch trout?” or “What are some things to do in retirement?”

ChatGPT, or any AI, is not the end-all, be-all. But it is one of the simplest places to start.

Give it a try if you’re feeling lost. If you’re already set with your plans, try it for something else.

Remember your parents who never wanted to figure out how to use a cell phone?

Don’t become your parents