Wednesday 4 April 2012

How The Roth IRA Differs From A Traditional IRA

By Jeremy Winters


An Individual Retirement Account (IRA) is actually a retirement plan in the laws of the US. The two most used types include the traditional IRA and the Roth IRA. The Roth IRA is actually a special type of retirement program in which withdrawals will not be taxed. Under this program, the amount placed into the account is not tax deductible, but later withdrawals will not be taxed. This will, on the other hand, be determined by specific conditions. For example, the account holder will need to keep their money in the account for a minimum of 5 years for tax free withdrawals. This program was unveiled under the US Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 and it is named for Senator William Roth whose efforts contributed to its legislation.

Under this particular retirement strategy, the account holder has the capacity to make personal investments such as trading securities like stocks and bonds and even investments in real estate. It could also be a retirement annuity if purchased from a life insurance provider. The primary benefits of this retirement program are its taxation structure and its flexible investment choices. It additionally doesn't have age limits and it has fewer restrictions with withdrawals.

This retirement program gives the owner additional money for reinvestment because their earnings on their contributions continually grow ultimately causing huge tax-free capital appreciation. That is referred to as tax-deferred compounding. The sooner one begins an IRA plan the better it will be simply because it will have even more time to grow. The contributions to the plan may be made so long as the holder of the account is employed and is earning a taxable income.

A Roth IRA also takes care of married couples when one spouse does not have a taxable income. In this case, an individual makes the contributions to a different account under the spouse's name. The couple could also opt to open up a joint account when they both have taxable income with an Adjusted Gross Income (AGI) of $173,000 or less.

This retirement plan could be inherited when the owner dies and then the transfer will also be tax free. The beneficiary could keep on making contributions into the plan and run the account. When the beneficiary is a partner of the deceased, they could decide to combine this inherited account with their own plan or run both plans independently.

There are actually penalties for early withdrawals with this program. Any kind of withdrawal made before the account is 5 years old will be subject to a tax penalty of 10%. Even so, there are some exceptions to the tax penalty for example in the case of death or permanent disability, medical expenses that go over 7.5% of your AGI and some others stipulated in the Taxpayer Relief Act.




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