Category: Tips for Retiree’s

2 Retirement Tax Planning Strategies To Save THOUSANDS In Your Retirement Portfolio!

Jason 0 Comments November 15, 2023 Retire Wealthy Retirement Planning Tips for Retiree's

how would you like to save hundreds of thousands of dollars potentially in taxes in retirement well these two strategies I'm going to go through today when combined together have the potential to do just that now if you don't qualify for net unrealized appreciation because you don't have company stock inside your 401k you can still qualify for zero percent taxes on your long-term capital gains and dividends so when we combine these strategies together it creates a very powerful tax and income planning tool that you can use for your retirement [Music] foreign as you can tell I'm pretty excited about this video because we're going to discuss two tax planning strategies the net unrealized appreciation which I've not yet done a video on the YouTube channel about and also the zero percent taxation for long-term capital gains and dividends and you're going to want to stick around until the end of the video where I incorporate these two strategies into a real life financial planning case now unless you've searched net unrealized appreciation to find this video there's a pretty good chance you've never heard of net unrealized appreciation so in its most basic form it's when you have company stock that's been issued inside your 401k you have the option of rolling that money outside of your 401k not into an IRA but rolling it out only paying income tax on the basis that's been distributed and potentially pay long-term capital gains tax on the appreciation so that appreciation from where it was issued to where it is whenever you roll it out and retire or sever from service or become 59 and a half that's what's called your net unrealized appreciation we're here in Houston Texas where we have a lot of client clients that worked at Exxon Mobil or Chevron or some of the other big oil and gas companies we also have clients from all over the country that work for other companies that can take advantage of this net unrealized depreciation strategy so I'm going to use Exxon because we come across this plan a lot we're very familiar with the Exxon retirement plan and I want to illustrate how this concept works and there's some nuances here and there's also some financial planning considerations and of course tax ramifications that we're going to go through but if I worked at Exxon let's say from 1995 to 2020 and as part of my compensation I receive shares of stock each year over the course of my employment so these numbers are not historically accurate but I want to convey the the principle here so in the beginning years if Exxon was trading at twenty dollars and I received a hundred shares and then next year maybe I received them at 22 dollars per share and twenty five dollars per share and over time as I've received more shares as part of my compensation package the value has typically increases the price at which you were issued those shares in the year you received them is what's called your cost basis so if we do this Nua rollout that's the amount that you'll have to pay income taxes on but it's a really cool opportunity here because over time most stocks appreciate in value Exxon today is at a hundred and sixteen dollars per share so the concept of Nua is if I was issued stock at twenty dollars a share and I keep it in the IRA and now it's at 116 dollars a share that's a massive amount of capital appreciation and if I roll it to an IRA and distribute it at that point or at some point in the future I'm going to income taxes and that can can lead to a pretty big tax liability now we're down the road when I need income but if stocks appreciate it over time we typically have a mixed cost basis when it comes to the amount of shares that we've received from the company so first thing to know here and first thing to ask your company is do you guys provide a breakdown of the cost basis on an annual reporting period or do you take the average cost basis so we come across some companies here that they will provide you the information of the exact cost basis and the amount of shares that you've received in each year in that case we can really cherry pick which shares we want to roll out and really take advantage of this strategy because typically we're going to take the lower cost basis ones some companies don't allow you to cherry pick based on the lower basis shares that were issued they calculate an average cost basis for all the shares issued so this is not nearly as advantageous as being able to cherry pick sometimes it can still make sense especially if it's an older 401k or if it's a stock that has really really appreciated since those shares were issued in the average cost basis is down so this video my primary purpose is to help educate you around the financial planning considerations of the Nua rollout so I'm not going to cover all the rules and reg surrounding it I'll do that in a later video though but a couple things you should know this becomes an opportunity whenever you sever from service or typically when you're entering retirement there are some other qualifications but we'll cover those later now if you sever from service prior to age 55 you will be subject to a 10 penalty on the amount you distribute so just be aware that if you're under the age of 55 you've severed from service you have company stock inside your 401k that that 10 penalty for early distribution still applies we have Exxon this 401K here so the total value is about 1.5 million in this hypothetical example the shares the tote in totality the shares have been issued over the course of the working career equals about a six hundred thousand dollar cost basis so I'm going to use the example here where we can cherry pick the individual shares so the next question becomes which shares should I consider doing the Nua rollout because I don't have to roll all six hundred thousand basis out in the real world typically this 1.5 million of fair market value may also be comprised of mutual funds such as growth funds income Etc within the 401K for the purpose of this example Exxon stock is valued at 1.5 million dollars the cost basis of those Exxon shares within the 401K is 600 000.

Just want to point out in the real world typically everyone does not have all their money invested in their company stock but I've I've absolutely seen that over the years so the question becomes which shares do we want to take advantage of the annual rollout with the general rule of thumb is the lower cost basis Shares are more attractive and that's determined by the the value of the stock today anything above 50 percent cost basis to fair market value typically we don't want to consider for Nua now there are some extenuating circumstances sometimes with financial planning considerations that it may make sense but when we do the math and we extrapolate out looking at the value that you would have in the ira versus paying taxes on the basis now annual taxation for growth dividends Etc the Breakeven point isn't that attractive when we look at these shares that are above 50 percent cost basis to fair market value I personally like to see them around 20 or 30 percent really tops so whenever you have shares that are 10 15 20 25 cost basis to fair market value those are typically very attractive opportunities and in some situations Thirty thirty five forty percent could possibly make sense it just depends on the overall financial plan that you're putting together in other circumstances so this is a tax analysis so you may want to reach out to your CPA for help or assistance in doing this or your financial advisor if they're qualified and skilled enough to help you make these determinations I want to run through some numbers now so let's assume for whatever reason this person decides to do the whole Nua rollout so just so we understand the how this functionally works the 600 000 rolls out of the 401K into a non-ira account income tax is due on that six hundred thousand dollars you're probably looking at about a 27 28 maybe 30 percent effective tax rate we'll go with 30.

So 100 eighty thousand dollars of income taxes would be due on the basis being rolled out but in this scenario you're not just rolling out 600 000 That's the basis you're actually rolling 1.5 million dollars out of the 401K and only paying income tax on the basis now if you sell it immediately the net unrealized appreciation is the difference between the basis and the fair market value so you have nine hundred thousand dollars of gain there so if you sell that nine hundred thousand you're looking at the more preferential long-term capital gains tax that would be a pretty big tax still so the question becomes the are what planning considerations should we hold on to this stock do we feel comfortable having this much in one company what is our other wealth what if we break it out over a few years so this is what we're really going to dive into now I just want you to understand how this actually works in regards to the functionality okay let's cover how this actually works so we take the Exxon stock the basis is 600 000 but the full value is 1.5 million so if in this example we decide we want to do it all we would roll the full 1.5 million out of the 401K it will go into a non-ira account but you only owe income taxes on the basis the 600 000.

If you sell the stock immediately you will owe long-term capital gains tax which is a more preferential rate than income taxes at this level of income on the difference between the basis and the fair market value or nine hundred thousand there but you don't have to sell it right away if you don't sell it right away and then you sell it six months later you'll be subject to short-term capital gains tax because you're holding period rules take take into a place or taken to effect if you don't sell it immediately but if you wait 12 months after the distribution date 12 months in one day then you qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment so some of the financial planning considerations are now what are the income taxes due what is my income and tax plan year one year two year three of retirement how does this fit into that overall tax and income plan and how do we optimize how do we reduce the total taxes we pay while maximizing the value that we retain if we have to pay income taxes on six hundred thousand dollars you're looking at an effective tax rate there of about 27 28 maybe 30 percent so 30 on 600 is a hundred and eighty Grand so you'd write that check to Uncle Sam and you would have 1.5 million outside of the 401K in the more preferential tax environment of long-term capital gains and dividends now you would have annual taxation on these dividends so that's something else we need to consider and we also need to consider future tax rates and make assumptions with what do we think income tax rates are going to be in the future long-term capital gains and dividend rates all of these things go into the analysis but for now this is the logistics of how it works we roll it all out pay income taxes on the basis we can either sell it immediately and pay long-term capital gains on the differential or we can hold it and if we hold it past the distribution date sell it within 12 months short-term capital gains sell it post 12 months long-term capital gains okay so I want to dive deeper into the two options we have just high level so option A is We Roll everything to the IRA we do not take advantage of the Nua rollout eligibility things that we have to consider here is future tax rates rmds other income sources and the secure act now this is not an exhaustive list this is just some of the big ones we have to take and consider future tax rates because when everything is inside that tax infested Ira when you distribute it in the future you have to pay income taxes you've given up the ability to take advantage of long-term capital gains and dividend taxes which are typically a preferential rate rmds Force distributions from your retirement account and when added with other income we oftentimes see people who did not plan for this have 150 200 250 even more of income because of required minimum distributions and their other income so when doing this analysis we have to extrapolate out and look at these factors to help make the decision today secure act I threw this in here because it forces distribution of your retirement accounts if they go to a non-spouse beneficiary that's more than 10 years younger than you full distribution of the retirement account within 10 years so if you have kids and it's important to leave this money to your children if they have income and they're working and now your retirement account has to be fully distributed within 10 years that could be a massive amount of income going on top of their income which now 30 40 50 60 potentially of your retirement account has gone to Uncle Sam if you live in a state with income taxes that could be an issue as well inheritance taxes so a lot of issues here rolling everything into the IRA you can be hit with um pretty big income taxes down the road option b is we do take advantage of the Nua rollout either wholly or in a partial Nua rollout how that works is we would take the shares that we do decide to take advantage of this strategy and we roll them into the non-ira account some things to consider there is that what are long-term capital gain rates now what are they possibly going to be in the future but also we have annual taxation of the dividends and if we're buying and selling inside that account whatever we do not roll into the non-ira account with the strategy the rest of the funds from your 401k go into the IRA and then of course whatever's left here we have the same considerations that I went through over here so now there are financial planning considerations here let's say I was at 35 cost basis to fair market value so I'm kind of right there where mathematically it may not make sense but how much non-qualified money do I have how much essentially I'm saying how much do you have outside of your retirement accounts because if you're entering retirement and all that money is inside that tax infested 401K then you don't have any ability to manipulate what goes on your 1040 your tax return by manipulate I mean we determine which accounts were withdrawing income from to manage our taxable income that we report to the IRS if we pull from our non-qualified accounts think your bank account well you don't have to report that so if you need a hundred thousand a year we pull 50 from your bank and 50 from your IRA you get your 100 000 but only fifty thousand goes on the tax return that's how we can manipulate that so how much non-qualified money do you have if you don't have much we may want to consider doing a little bit higher Nua rollout because even mathematically it may not make sense when we just compare that decision in isolation to do or not to do the Nua rollout but when we now look at the other benefits that we're receiving such as the ability to do Roth conversions the ability to manipulate what goes on our 1040 the ability to possibly qualify for a health care subsidy if you retire before the age of 65 by managing the reportable or taxable income that's reportable we can qualify for a subsidy so this is why we're so big on financial planning because as you can see it's not just about Investment Management in retirement that's important absolutely but when we tie in financial planning with Investment Management we can create some really optimal scenarios where we're creating a ton of value and helping you have more income pay less tax and ultimately have more value throughout the course of your retirement okay this is the part that I mentioned in the beginning of the video where we're going to tie into kind of a real world plan planning case so we laid the groundwork for what Nua is and some of the considerations that you have to make in order to determine if it makes sense for you to do the Nua rollout so what I want to point out here is the tax and income plan for retirement years one two and three for someone who takes advantage of the Nua rollout because the question becomes when do we sell that stock if we have 30 40 50 percent of our entire net worth in our company stock it's pretty risky to hold on to that position just so we don't pay more in taxes so here's where we're going to tie the financial planning considerations of the real world application and decisions we have to make on the Nua rollout with years one two and three of someone just entering retirement one of the big risks is if we roll it out the company's stock and we decide not to sell it because we don't want to pay the long-term capital gains immediately if we hold on to that that concentrated Equity position we have increased our risk now there are investment strategies that can be used such as buying a put option or what we call an Equity caller but I want to just talk about the tax and income plan here so in this scenario client rolls out the annual way so they have a large concentrated Equity position and they've paid income tax on the basis but do not want to sell the company stock yet so as part of the tax and income plan what I want to show you is we could break this up so year two year three and even year four possibly depending on the size of the concentrated Equity position Company stock where zero percent taxes essentially so we have total income here of a hundred and twenty thousand so what this is the tax and income strategy where we're generating income year two of retirement not year one because in year one you've done the the Nua rollout you have a big tax liability from paying income taxes on the cost basis of that company stock so here's your two so year two the the tax and income strategy is don't take anything out of the 401K no Roth conversions we're going to sell the company stock that we previously rolled out take advantage of Nua and we can have a hundred and twenty thousand dollars of income here as long as it's all capital gains and dividends your total tax liability 458 dollars now what I've done here is assumed twenty thousand dollars of dividends because if you have company stock and you roll it out it probably paid some dividends so 20K there and a hundred thousand of long-term capital gains we're realizing we're recognizing so this is darn near zero percent on a hundred and twenty thousand dollars of retirement income and we're divesting from that company stock now again some risk management strategies we could have an equity caller or put option helping to support downside volatility of that concentrated position but just taxing in complaining wise I want to show you how how this can work out so here now I've added 125 000 of long-term capital gains with twenty thousand dollars of dividends total AGI 145 000 the total tax 4208 on 145k of income 2.9 percent so again we've divested so maybe this is year two of retirement or year three we've divested from the company stock we've reduced our risk we've provided the income that we needed for retirement and we've done so in a way that's tax advantaged same thing goes on now I wanted to point this one out because I've here I've thrown in the same 20 000 of dividends 125 000 of long-term capital gains so we're selling the stock again but now we also take advantage of a twenty thousand dollar Ira distribution so this is which accounts do we pull income from in retirement how do we generate income what's the tax plan total AGI comes up to 165 the total tax is 7208 but here's the cool part the IRS ordering rules for how you pay tax on income based on where that income is generated the distribution from the IRA is actually tax-free but what happens is when you take money out of the IRA it brings some of those long-term capital gains into taxation so I did a video not too long ago where we talked about adjustments and Social Security and IRA distributions and wealth conversion taxes the tax code is filled with these where if we we take one more dollar of income it brings one other item into now a taxable State such as Social Security or long-term capital gains or dividends so just just be aware of that I guess 165 000 of income seven thousand two hundred and eight dollars in income taxes representing a four point four percent tax rate so now one two three four years into retirement we've divested the uh concentrated stock risk we provided income and a very tax advantaged manner we still have that Ira with a lot of money in it to deal with but once this is done we would probably at that point start down the Roth conversion path now every situation is different but hopefully these topics and ideas and and considerations when it comes to risk management income planning tax planning and retirement will help you have a better retirement if you want to learn in more detail how to potentially pay zero percent in long-term capital gains and on your dividends click this video right here I did a couple years ago where we do a deeper dive into the special tax advantage [Music] thank you

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