John Cox

Blogs · @wyome

Tagged 401(k) · everything

Before Your 401(k) RMDs Start at 73, Make Sure You Execute This Tax-Saving Move in Your 60s

Lays out a concrete year-by-year Roth conversion plan for a couple retiring in their early 60s with $2M in traditional 401(k)s, using the low-income gap years before Social Security and RMDs to convert roughly $77,000 annually and fill the 12%-to-22% bracket space. It quantifies the payoff — over $400,000 in lifetime tax savings versus letting the balance compound untouched to a $4M RMD time bomb — and flags practical traps like the IRMAA two-year lookback and the importance of paying conversion taxes from the brokerage account rather than the IRA itself. Worth keeping as a specific, numbers-driven template rather than generic "consider converting to Roth" advice.

Permalink