LIVING OFF DIVIDENDS & PASSIVE INCOME

If you’ve ever switched jobs and contributed to a 401k plan, chances are you just the old plan at the old company. Unless of course it was under $5,000 and they told to take it with you!

I have 2 such 401k’s that are currently orphaned. If both the companies went bankrupt, I’d have to jump to a lot of hoops to get my money back. It wouldn’t be impossible, but it would be an unnecessary  hassle and waste of time. Better to liquidate the positions and transfer the cash in to what’s known as a roll-over IRA. Or if you’re not planning to work in the year of the transfer, you might opt to convert it into a ROTH IRA because you’d be in a lower tax bracket and wouldn’t much taxes on the conversion.

The difference between a regular IRA and a ROTH is that in the first one you pay no tax now, but pay taxes on withdrawals in retirement. In the ROTH, you pay tax now, but you withdraw your money later totally tax-free. Of course, there are income limitations governing whether you can participate in a ROTH so check with your tax person.

Currently TDAmeritrade is offering $500 if you transfer the assets of your old 401k into a roll-over IRA. That’s a pretty good incentive to money my retirement money out of their existing home. I think the offer code is 164, but you should double check for yourself. I wonder if they’d pay me the $500 twice, since I’ll be transferring two accounts?

• Get Advertising Revenue From Prosper I've been lending money on Prosper.com for nearly a year now. I've been getting a pretty decent rate of return, despite having had a couple of borrowers default. I've also made over $200 from referrals fees! Whenever anyone signs up using the referral link and funds atleast $50, we both......
• Old 401k Does Well I left my previous company last March and therefore stopped contributing to the 401k. I was planning to roll it over into a rollover-IRA but didn't get around to it. Luckily I did check in a few times to make sure the asset allocation was ok and I'm glad I......
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• Tax Free Retirement Investing with Your Health Savings Account Several years ago, my employer switched our group health insurance to a high deductible plan with a Health Savings Accounts (HSA).  Unless and until the Obama administration manages to totally revamp our health care system on a national scale, I suspect that many baby boomers will be introduced to the Health Savings Account......
• Investing with YOUR Self-Directed Individual Retirement Account (IRA) Part 2 If you're just starting your IRA now, and say you have $5,000 - $25,000 in your IRA, that might not be enough to bother with trying to get into a commercial real estate investment with.  For a high-quality commercial property, you're going to have to put 20% down in......
• Sunday Money Roundup - The Sox Are Still In First Edition. Sure, the gap is closing, as it always does toward the end of the season...but my Red Sox are in first place still and I am enjoying every minute of it. The Yankees are close behind but as long as they are behind, I am happy. Anyway, here are some......

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