The 2020 RMD Waiver and How it May Affect Your Retirement Plan

The 2020 RMD Waiver and How it May Affect Your Retirement Plan

The CARES Act (or the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act) was an enormous piece of legislation enacted in March 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. It was designed to mitigate the effects that lockdown and lost business (and wages) were having on employers and employees. Its passage was preceded by the SECURE Act (Setting Every Community Up for Retirement) in late December 2019. Both brought many changes to retirement plan design, participation, and administration.

Waiving the requirement for required minimum distributions

One change concerns the 2020 required minimum distribution (RMD) that retirement account owners or participants historically had to withdraw upon reaching age 70½ .These distributions must be taken for Traditional IRAs, SIMPLE IRAs, SEP IRAs, rollover IRAs, and most 401(k) and 403(b) plans. RMDs do not apply to Roth IRAs unless it is an inherited IRA.

However, for 2020, the CARES Act waives RMDs. Even if you’d already been taking this distribution, you no longer have to do so in 2020 (which enables you to keep those funds in a tax-advantaged retirement plan for continued investment and growth).

Here are some other updates regarding RMD regulations:

Additional RMD updates:

As with any retirement plan and investment, individuals are encouraged to consult their trusted advisor or tax professional to work out the best way to handle their required minimum distributions—whether to take advantage of this year’s waiver, do a rollover, or wait until age 72 to begin, depending on your age and situation. If you have a qualified retirement plan through work, check with the plan administrator about your options.

RMDs and self-directed retirement plans

The RMD waivers and updated provisions concerning these distributions apply to self-directed retirement plans as well. And, with the age increase for taking these distributions, self-directed investors with alternative assets within their plans have the potential to accrue more retirement income from real estate, precious metals, private equity, and many more nontraditional investments these plans allow. There is also now a longer time horizon for using self-directed funds for unsecured or secured loans, which are other popular ways to invest through a self-directed IRA.

The professionals at Next Generation are available to help you calculate your RMD when you’re ready—whether in 2020 or in the future—and will handle all the tax reporting and administration associated with your self-directed IRA. If you have questions about RMDs or about self-direction as a retirement wealth-building strategy, you can schedule a complimentary educational session. To connect with our team directly, call Next Generation at 888.857.8058 or email us at NewAccounts@NextGenerationTrust.com.

Amid Stock Market Downturn, Consider Self-Directed IRAs

Many investors are dealing with yet another stock market downturn, which is in reaction to current events such as global concerns about the Coronavirus and U.S. politics during an election year. These and other factors—from geopolitics to macroeconomics, trade issues to plant closings to a company’s profitability and earnings—can influence a stock market downturn.

Stocks by nature are volatile, which is why many investors look to alternative assets to build their retirement savings and avoid stock market downturns that are often hard to predict. That means looking at self-directed IRAs, which allow individuals to include a variety of nontraditional investments and build a more diverse retirement portfolio based on assets they already know and understand.

Look at it this way: unless they work there, many people are not experts on what a Blue Chip or Fortune 500 company produces or sells, and they certainly cannot control what those companies do in the marketplace. However, many people know a lot about investing in real estate, precious metals, or private equity. Others like the idea of including secured or unsecured loans in their retirement plan, with terms they determine with the borrower. All of these investment types can be included in a self-directed IRA, where investors build retirement wealth with alternative assets—and have better control over their earnings.

A self-directed IRA has the same tax advantages as regular retirement plans with the added bonus of being a great hedge against stock market volatility. For those who are comfortable making their own investment decisions and conducting their due diligence, self-direction is a powerful retirement strategy.

Typical retirement plans offered by brokerage houses or banks limit investors to publicly traded stocks, bonds, certificates of deposit, and mutual or exchange-traded funds. But a self-directed IRA allows you to hold the alternative investments noted above plus notes, private placements, limited partnerships, tax lien certificates and more.

Our whitepaper library has a lot of great information about self-directed IRAs and our helpful team is here to answer your questions about self-direction. To find out more about self-direction, you may call us at 888.857.8058 or send an email to  NewAccounts@NextGenerationTrust.com. Alternatively, you can sign up for a complimentary educational session with one of our knowledgeable representatives.