Rollover IRA to Solo 401k
It looks like the Roth IRA conversion rule changes will stick, at least for 2010. There are only three months until the end of 2009. Congress is busy with something else. I don't think they will repeal the current law before the end of the year.
In preparation for converting my non-deductible IRA contributions to Roth IRA in 2010, I'm rolling over the pre-tax portion of my traditional IRA to my solo 401k. I set up the solo 401k last year primarily for this purpose — to provide a harbor for my pre-tax IRA money so I won't get taxed proportionally on my Roth conversion. After the rollover, I should have only one small IRA, consisting of my non-deductible contributions plus or minus market fluctuations from now until I convert in January 2010.
I have my solo 401k with Fidelity. When I called them about the rollover procedures, to my surprise, the rep actually discouraged me from doing so. To his credit, he made valid points. He knew what he was talking about. Fidelity trained them well.
Feel-Good Retirement Savings Initiatives
Over the Labor Day weekend, the Obama administration announced some new retirement savings initiatives that are supposed to help Americans save money for their retirement. Although they are all well intentioned, I doubt they will have a material impact on the overall picture of retirement savings in America. I call them feel-good measures because the new initiatives merely clarify existing laws and regulations. Let's look at them one by one.
1. Sample language for 401k plan auto-enrollment. The IRS gave employers some sample language for adding auto-enrollment to their 401k or SIMPLE IRA plans. The IRS also made it clear it's legal to automatically increase the employees' contribution percentages.
Half of the workforce does not have a retirement savings plan at work. Auto-enrollment can't help if you don't have a plan to begin with. For the other half, the employers will still have to take the trouble to add auto-enrollment. After that, auto-enrollment usually only covers new employees. Employers very rarely re-auto-enroll existing employees if they are not already enrolled. So we are only talking about a low single digit percent of the workforce here.
Retirement Plans Galore: 401(a), 401(k), 403(b), 457, SEP, SIMPLE
A reader sent me an e-mail some time ago about the interplay between a 401(a) plan and a Roth solo 401(k) plan. You probably heard of 401(k), 403(b), and 457 plans. The names of these plans come from the section numbers in the tax code which specify the rules for these plans.
401(k) plans are offered primarily by private sector employers. Employees in public schools and tax-exempt organizations have 403(b) plans. State and local governments and tax-exempt organizations have 457 plans. Some employers offer both a 403(b) plan and a 457 plan. What is a 401(a) plan then?
Strictly speaking a 401(a) plan is a bit of a misnomer because other kinds of plans including 401(k) plans must also qualify under tax code 401(a). In a loose context, a 401(a) plan is a retirement savings plan in which employees can't choose or change the amount contributed to the plan. It's also called a "money purchase plan."
Reforming the 401k: Good Ideas and Bad Ideas
When stock market crashed, people's 401(k) accounts crashed with it. Needless to say people are not happy. They are saying 401k's don't work. Wall Street Journal published an article How to Fix 401(k)s by Anne Tergesen. It listed many proposals for changing the 401k's (and 403(b)s and 457's). I think some of the proposals are good ideas while some others aren't so good. I'm listing the ideas here with some short comments. Read the WSJ article if you are interested in more details.
Good ideas:
1. Auto-enroll all employees. Default contribution % and investment. Average participation rate among eligible employees in companies with a defined contribution plan is about 70%. That's too low. Auto enrollment and default contribution and investment choices make it easier for everybody to participate in the plan. If the employees did nothing, they will be in the plan, have a reasonable contribution percentage and a reasonably diversified investment.
Solo 401k For Part-Time Self-Employment
In A Non-Deductible IRA Is Worth It For Me, I mentioned I'm going to establish a self-employed 401(k) plan, also known as a solo 401k plan or an individual 401k plan. This is in part for providing a safe haven in 2009 for the pre-tax money in my IRAs, in preparation for converting the remaining after-tax money in my IRAs to Roth in 2010. It will also allow me to shelter a little bit of money from my self-employment income. Every bit helps, you know?
When I tried to figure out how much I can contribute from my self-employment income to the solo 401k, I found that the information on the Internet assumes that the self-employment income is the person's only earned income. For example the calculation worksheets provided by Fidelity, Schwab, and Vanguard all make that assumption. They don't consider the cases like me who work at a day job while earning some self-employment income on the side. Because I participate in the 401k plan at work, the maximum I can contribute to my solo 401k plan changes with what I earn from my day job and what I contribute to the workplace 401k plan. The Social Security tax I pay depends on the sum of my salary as an employee and my self-employment income. The salary deferral contributions I can make from self-employment income also depends on how much I already contribute to my 401k plan at my day job. I would think there are enough consultants, freelancers, moonlighters, and bloggers who are in the same camp as I am, but there is very little resource I could find for people who earn their income from a mix of W-2 salary and self-employment.
You know where this is going to lead to, don't you? I had to create a spreadsheet for myself and I'm sharing it here in case other people like me find it helpful.
401k Loan Double Taxation Myth
I don't know who started it. Suze Orman certainly helped spread it. She says that you shouldn't borrow from your 401k (or 403b) plan because you will be double-taxed. I did a Google search and I found 5 priceless money-saving tips by Suze Orman:
"Also, never ever borrow against your 401k plan because you will pay double taxation on the money you borrow. Because you don't pay taxes on the money you put into a 401k, when you pay back the loan (which you must do within five years, or 15 years if used to buy a home), you pay it back with money you have paid taxes on. Then, when you retire and take the money out again, you end up paying taxes on it a second time."
This allegation is all over the place — MSN, USA Today, The Motley Fool, Moolanomy blog. It is a myth because there is NO double taxation. It's a mind trick similar to that well-known "where's the missing dollar" puzzle. » Read more …
Alternatives to a High Cost 401k Or 403b Plan
This is a common problem: you have a 401k or 403b plan at work, but the plan isn't very good. All the investment options in the plan have high expenses. The plan itself may also have some hidden fees. If the plan has a match, you contribute enough to get the full match. That's a no-brainer, because the match will more than compensate for the high costs and hidden fees. But then what? Any additional money you contribute to the plan won't get any more match. Or perhaps the plan doesn't have a match to begin with or your employer contributes to the plan regardless whether you contribute or not. In these cases, should you still contribute to the high cost 401k or 403b plan even when there is no [additional] match? I made a spreadsheet to compare the alternatives.
1. Roth IRA. If you are eligible, contributing to a Roth IRA is a good alternative to a no-match 401k or 403b. Because a Roth IRA is under your own control, you can buy low cost funds in your Roth IRA. The lower your costs, the more investment returns you get to keep.
2. Non-Deductible IRA. If you are not eligible for contributing to a Roth IRA, you are still eligible to contribute to a non-deductible Traditional IRA. The contributions are not tax deductible but the investments grow tax deferred inside the IRA. Under the current law, there is an opportunity to convert a non-deductible Traditional IRA to a Roth IRA in 2010 and thereafter. This 2010 Roth conversion issue is beyond the scope for this post. See Should I Contribute To A Non-Deductible IRA? Part 1, Part 2 on My Money Blog for more information. For the purpose of this post, I assume the non-deductible IRA is going to stay as-is and not converted to Roth.
My 401k Hidden Fees Experiment
Back in March, I wrote Uncover The Hidden Fees In Your 401(k) Plan. Because the hidden fees are so hard to pin down, I gave a method which helps find out if there are hidden fees in the plan and if so how much the hidden fees are.
- Find in your plan's menu one fund that you are not using.
- Do a one-time transfer and move $100 to it. Do not include this fund in your periodic payroll contributions.
- Wait until a full quarter passes. On your next quarterly statement you should have the beginning and ending balance for that fund.
- Calculate your gain/loss in that fund. Compare your actual gain/loss with the fund's reported performance in the quarterly statement.
I did this test in my own plan. Before the end of the first quarter, I transferred a small amount to a fund I wasn't using. During the second quarter, I did not add any more money to the fund. The money sat in the fund untouched for the entire quarter. Now I'm able to calculate my gain or loss and compare it with the performance reported by the fund.
Roth 401(k) for People Who Contribute the Max
Back in March I wrote The Case Against Roth 401(k) in which I said I think for most people the majority, if not 100%, of the contribution should go to a Traditional 401(k). I gave these reasons:
- Fill in lower tax brackets in retirement
- Avoid high state income tax
- Leave the option open for Roth conversion in the future
- Avoid triggering phase-outs and AMT
I still believe these are valid reasons in favor of contributing to a Traditional 401k instead of a Roth 401k. A few comments to that post said Roth is better because a Roth 401k lets you effectively shelter more from taxes than a Traditional 401k. That is true. My response was that the higher effective maximum comes into play only if someone actually contributes the maximum allowed, currently at $15,500 per person per year. According to a study by Vanguard, only 10% of people contribute the maximum. It's not surprising because in order to contribute the maximum, you need either a high income, a high savings rate, or both. Consider a married couple. The combined 401k and IRA maximum contributions are $41,000 per year. At 25% savings rate, this couple needs $160,000 of income. At 15% savings rate, this couple has to earn $270,000.
Uncover The Hidden Fees In Your 401(k) Plan
Marketplace Money, the personal finance program on public radio, had a segment on 401k plan fees a few weeks ago. The host Tess Vigeland interviewed pension consultant Matthew Hutcheson, who said 90% or more of all the 401k plans pay 3-3.5% in fees. Here's a quote from the transcript:
Vigeland: How high do some of these costs go? Are we talking 3 percent? 5 percent?
Subscribe
