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      12-20-2018, 08:32 PM   #4
Winn.Nguyen
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Drives: BMW
Join Date: Jan 2016
Location: Portland

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It all depends on the company you're moving to. If your new company allows Roth contributions, they may want to keep both money types separated. Your new Roth deferrals will have it's own "bucket" and so will your pre-tax deferrals.

If you're doing a direct rollover, in most cases it'll be dollar for dollar into the same money source. Meaning if you have X amount of pre-tax rollover monies, it'll be moved to your new 401k plan as pre-tax monies. Now, there are some 401(k) plans that allow Roth conversions (this will need to verified with your new company) with the assistance of their provider (John Hancock, for example), while other companies may require you to process an Indirect Rollover instead. If you end up with this option, you'll receive your balance as if it's paid directly to youself. At that point, you'll have 60 days to work on the conversion with your tax guy. It's important to get it all done as soon as possible, because if you miss the 60 day limit, Uncle Sam will count it as a distribution and it will become a taxable event. You'll pay a minimum of 20% Fed tax, whatever applicable state tax, and a possible 10% IRS penalty (if you're younger than 59.5 years of age). For example, where I'm from, at the least, l would see a total of 40% of my balance gone. Keep in mind, this pertains to pre-tax balances. Roth balances have different provisions.

The Roth conversion formula will be based on your most recent tax bracket. Be ready to see a chunk of change go away, but know that you would've had to pay that eventually. The same thing will apply if you were just moving this to a personal account.