When you retire or leave on employer for another you generally have the option to take the retirement funds you have in your 401(k), 403(b), 457 or any other type of qualified retirement plan into your own “self directed” IRA Plan. Caution needs to prevail here because you want to do it in a manner that preserves the tax deferral on those monies as well as does not trigger a taxable event. Another very important aspect that needs some careful and professional review is if you have company stock inside your plan there are ways to achieve even better tax advantages when you “roll over” your account.
IRA and Company Plan Rollovers
It is best to discuss all of the options with someone who is able to offer you all of your options and provide you with the procedures and steps to make sure your tax deferral and transfer is done without any current tax consequences. You may not know this but some employer plans allow for a current employee that is not retiring, but over a certain age, to do an “in service” rollover of some of the assets in the employer plan. This is a very attractive way to balance the assets you have and provide some investment alternatives which may not be available as one of your plan choices now.
If you are interested in changing the location of your current IRA for perhaps a different investment, doing so should be done with the utmost diligence to make sure you haven’t caused any unforeseen taxable events and owe current income taxes on that transfer. You can transfer your IRA’s to different kinds of investments with out any taxes being owed as long as you follow the strict rules and guidelines outlined by the IRS.
We are able to help you out in any and all of these circumstances.