Sorry for the loss of your DH, and hope you are having some emotional support from family and friends as you are dealing with your grief as well as these decisions.
Certainly contact SS by phone (local office) and reference the letter you received about back payments of SS and the WEX - it seems that they can make a determination since they have approved SSD, and can be clear on this.
SS and the government seem to work with the principle that the benefits are not for the month of death. When my mother died Nov 1, fortunately she lived through October so nothing had to be paid back, as her next payment from SS had not been made yet when we contacted SS.
If you can use leave time at work while getting things sorted out. You donāt want to decide to exit work/retire during this period of grief time and later realize you wanted to stay working a while longer. IDK if you want to wait the year for making that decision (often recommended to not change important things during that time frame).
With the Fidelity Advisor, again, if important decisions are uncovered - see if you can have time on the recommendations (maybe a follow up meeting) and not implement them/have them triggered right at this meeting w/o time for significant thought/reflection.
You went to all the trouble to have Roth IRAs, it seems pretty simple to roll them into an account be it Vanguard, Fidelity, to maintain the after tax benefit. However, you also can just decide to cash them out which doesnāt add to taxable income because taxes have already been paid.
Having things simple is good. I only worked at my last employer for under 5 years, and 401k was great as the cash input from me was small, I was 100% vested, and very good ROI. It was easy for me to cash out and just add to our taxable income that year.
Who do you have your account with? As another poster mentioned, thereās nothing like a Roth CD, just Roth IRA within which you can invest in a CD. In a typical Roth, you can invest in CDs, treasuries, stocks, etfs and mutual funds so donāt take the money out of the Roth and lose the benefit of tax free growth. If your Roth provider for some reason does not provide those options, best move the account to another provider such as Fidelity (takes 5 minutes to open an account) so you can invest into whatever you want. At a minimum combine the two so you are dealing with one account and not two. AFAIK, the 5 year clock does not start when you move the account from one brokerage to another.
I want to underline what you said about taking leave but not deciding about retirement right now. I sometimes think if I had just taken several months when my mom was actively dying and right afterward I might have had it in me to keep working a few more years. Itās working out fine but I did enjoy it.
clearly not enough to move the needle, so I also vote for simplification. Cash them in.
edited to add: I had a similar issue, but with inherited savings bonds. Loved that they were tax free, and an interest rate that was better than my mortgage, but having to deal with Treasury Direct for several hundred dollars of interest per year was just not worth it.
Please, no more responses----I thought my question was simpleā2 options, both involving banks, clarified that we were very risk averse, had no interest in brokerage firmsāplease, we have no interest in Vanguard, Fidelity, etc., etc., I could never sleep at night knowing my money was not protected they way it is in banksāitās just the way I am!
@Youdon_tsay We have moved most of our cash to our Vanguard brokerage account. Easy 5+%. USAA was still paying .01%. Still have some in the USAA money market, mainly because itās easier for us to transfer $$ quickly to our regular checking account or to S2ās USAA account in case of emergency.
Weāve been so good about keeping funds consolidated for so long, but trying to get better rates on cash the past two years has resulted in a couple new accounts. More things to add to the master spreadsheet!
Given the amounts you mention, your money would be just as FDIC insured at a brokerage as it would be at a bank (which are subject to the same deposit limits for insurance). Posters are just trying to help you maximize your returns. Like all advice on CC, take it or leave it.
Exactly, in fact, your money is safer spread out through different banks and brokerages. My mother had a large chunk of money sitting in her credit union, earning almost nothing, thinking it was completely safe, no matter what happened. Nope. NCUA insures individual credit union accounts only up to 250K. We opened up a bank account for her, FDIC insures that up to 250K. She now has accounts at Vanguard and Fidelity, which the SIPC insures up to 500K each. She wants simple and safe. Things are still simple, much safer, and instead of earning $10/yr in interest, sheās earning about 50K/yr in high interest savings accounts and money market funds.
Thank you. I donāt want to make any big decisions with regard to Fidelity. I know heās going to nudge for some, but Iām going to tell him Iām ok with lower earnings or whatever for this year.
Thanks for the advice to call SS. I will do that soon!
I have been pleasantly surprise with my help with Social Security. Usually you make an initial call; be prepared to be on hold for close to 2 hours, although sometimes you get the options for a call back instead of holding. After the initial call, you might either have an phone appointment with your local SS office, or maybe in person. I went in person with every document I thought they might need, and was approved on the spot to receive my husbandās SS and well as a life change event for the IRMAA we had been paying. It was so easy, and after horror stories about SS, I was worried.
SS is the government, so things move at a very slow pace, so be patient!
We might have a case of inheriting an IRA from someone whose estate will likely require estate taxes to be due. How does the IRA work. There is a trust that leaves the estate to several descendants. Would the IRA liquidate, pay the taxes and money go into the trust or does the IRA get divided and the descendants have the option of rolling it over into individual accounts?
The executor of the estate will have to consult an estate tax specialist/attorney on this so use this as guidance only. The ideal way to go about this would be to break up the IRA into multiple Inherited IRAs (one for each beneficiary). Each non-spouse recipient will have 10 years to pull that money out and pay taxes (either a certain amount each year or all at once at the end of 10 years). A minor beneficiary may have different withdrawal timeline (more than 10 years. Please confirm). A spouse can roll it over into their own IRA and withdrawal will follow their own IRA/401K withdrawal schedule based on RMD rules for their age.
Also make sure that the IRA had all beneficiaries named as beneficiaries on the account. If someone else was named or only a few of them were named, that will take precedence over whatever a will might say. Again, you need to consult with an estate tax specialist/attorney to confirm all this.
Estate taxes on the total estate, if any, should be paid from money thatās not in the IRA (e.g. savings, brokerage, etc.) if at all possible so taxes are deferred.
Just to add, if there was estate planning done prior the beneficiary of the IRA might be a trust. My fatherās was set up that way. The IRA funds into the Trust and then the trust distributes the funds into inherited IRA accounts for each beneficiary named in the Will.
If the IRA is left to the beneficiaries, I donāt believe that it passes through the estate (so proceeds would not be used to pay estate taxes). I could be wrong, and/or it could vary by state. But that has been my laypersonās understanding. Each beneficiary would inherit whatever percentage was left to them (sometimes itās done by percentage & other times itās āequally divided ā).
The IRAs donāt pass through the estate for probate purposes, but I think they still count towards the total value of the estate for calculating the estate tax due. Presumably there could be circumstances where the IRA is the main or only source of funds to pay the taxes due?
I have a question about HSA contributions for the year you turn 65 and enroll in Medicare. I understand that you can make a pro rate contribution based on the number of months youāre not on Medicare, but I canāt find a definitive answer on the extra $1000 ācatch upā contribution for those 55 and older.
Intuitively it seems that should be prorated too, but cursory internet research seems to suggest the full $1000 can be contributed.
I have not dealt with Medicare yet, but had to handle a similar situation the year that my youngest graduated from college. My research at the time suggested that I could claim the full $1000 catch-up contribution while prorating the remainder for the seven months he was enrolled on my HDHP.
Not suggesting that the Finance Buff is a reputable site, but I believe this is what I referenced, probably after reading about it on Bogleheads.
I am guessing the IRS addresses this somewhere but could be painful to research. Does an AARP site discuss the topic?