Retirement Journey Radio

Every pre-tax IRA and 401(k) has a silent partner: the IRS, and its share grows every time your account does. This week, Retirement Journey Radio calls it the tax tumor and shows why cutting it out with a Roth conversion costs you potentially nothing, because that tax was never yours to begin with. Then a case study: a hypothetical couple with $1.1 million in IRAs pays about $2.1 million in lifetime taxes staying pre-tax and about only $318,000 converting, and ends up with potentially $2.87 million more in lifetime wealth.

The United States crossed $40 trillion in debt on August 19th — climbing about five and a half million dollars a minute. This week Retirement Journey Radio skips the outrage and talks about what it means for money you spent decades saving, and how a side-by-side look at both paths lets the math, not opinions, decide.

You spent forty years moving the ball downfield. None of it scores. The red zone — roughly five years either side of your retirement date — is where the plan actually gets decided, and the rules change once you're inside the twenty yard line.

This week we run the real numbers showing the difference a true “retirement red zone” strategy can make vs simply doing the same plays that got you into the red zone. Then we get into the research on predictable income — including why it shows up in bloodwork, stress level, and longer longevity, not just balance sheets — and close with the best description of lifetime income ever written, by a novelist, in 1811.

Whether you can put your finger on it or not, American savers say they are feeling one thing pertaining to their retirement right now: pressure. 

While paying voluntary tax is likely an insulting thought, so many retirees are setup to do exactly that. The US Treasury has a big heart and will accept voluntary taxes from retirees--but we think you shouldn't pay them. This week, we aim to inform you on how to start paying way less in taxes in retirement on your accounts and keep more of what's yours. 

Roth conversions aren’t about avoiding taxes — they’re about deciding when, how, and at what rate you’ll pay them. Too many people focus on the micro view: “How much tax will this cost me this year?” A better question is, “How will this decision impact my entire retirement?”

Strategic conversions can create decades of tax-free income, reduce or eliminate required minimum distributions, lower Medicare premiums and Social Security taxation, and provide insulation from future tax increases. Yes, there can be short-term friction — higher taxable income or temporary IRMAA surcharges — but for many households, those are time-boxed issues in exchange for long-term control, certainty, and tax-free wealth.

More important than your asset allocation is your asset location. There are only 3 columns (categories) of financial vehicles:

Taxable

Tax-deferred

Tax-free

Before deciding what your allocation should be, you must decide where you want your assets to live. There is a perfect balance for each saver. In this episode, we dive into the advantages and disadvantages of each column, the proper uses of the assets that make up in column, and how to strategically transfer taxable and tax-deferred assets to the tax-free column.

Almost all retirement goals combine to one common end: peace and confidence in retirement. What retirement strategies tend to support that aim, and which--unknowingly--tend to diminish the likelihood of its achievement? Today, we how to bring your retirement assets and strategies into alignment with your goals. 

Making sure your portfolio provides what you need it to through thick and thin means going beyond "buy and hold". What if interest rates skyrocket, bringing inflation in their wake? What if the market crashes for several years? What if new legislation changes the tax landscape to resemble a foreign world? Premature death, long-term care needs, unforeseen emergencies...the list goes on. Your plan needs to elements of flexibility and rigidity in the right balance to handle whatever comes out of the woodwork. 

One dollar. That's all it can take to cross a line that costs a retired couple over $2,000 a year in Medicare surcharges — for the rest of retirement. That's a 200%+ tax bracket on that single dollar. It's not a typo, and it's not rare. This week: the tax torpedo, the IRMAA cliff, and the shadow tax you never saw coming.