Cashing out 401K to payoff mortgage

[Anonymous]

To cut to the chase:

Investing in real estate may be a good component to returement planning. That's for each individual to decide. BUT taking money out of your 401(k) and (i) incurring the 10% penalty, and (ii) paying taxes at the presumably higher income level that you have now, as opposed to retirement, will hardly ever be a good decision. Sure, sometimes you'll strike gold, but odds are you're better off keeping the money in the tax advantaged 401k and redirective future retirement savings to real estate. If that means delayed gratification, so be it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To cut to the chase:

Investing in real estate may be a good component to returement planning. That's for each individual to decide. BUT taking money out of your 401(k) and (i) incurring the 10% penalty, and (ii) paying taxes at the presumably higher income level that you have now, as opposed to retirement, will hardly ever be a good decision. Sure, sometimes you'll strike gold, but odds are you're better off keeping the money in the tax advantaged 401k and redirective future retirement savings to real estate. If that means delayed gratification, so be it.

are you 401k consultant

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To cut to the chase:

Investing in real estate may be a good component to returement planning. That's for each individual to decide. BUT taking money out of your 401(k) and (i) incurring the 10% penalty, and (ii) paying taxes at the presumably higher income level that you have now, as opposed to retirement, [b]will hardly ever[b] be a good decision. Sure, sometimes you'll strike gold, but odds are you're better off keeping the money in the tax advantaged 401k and redirective future retirement savings to real estate. If that means delayed gratification, so be it.

You misspelled "never."

[Anonymous]

To follow up:

Say you need $200,000 to purchase an investment property. To clear that out of your 401k, assuming you have an HHI of over $217,450, you will need to take out about $350,000. So you do that, and you buy your $200,000 property. Say you get $2000 per month in rental income, which is WILDLY optimistic. It will take you 175 months, or almost 15 years, to make back the amount you removed for your 401k. And that doesn't take into account the taxes you pay on the rental income, repairs, vacant months, or the fact that there's no effin' way you're getting $2000/month on a $200,000 rental property. So call it 20 years.

In 20 years, at a 4% rate of return, that $350,000 you took out of your 401k would be about $800,000. Still tax deferred.

Real estate can use the tax code to its investment advantage, when you find a property that pays for its own carrying costs (PITI + vacancy rate) and you build equity using other people's money. But the margins are pretty close, even when considering the high rental incomes around DC and the historically low interest rates. Adding a 10% penalty on top of that, plus the income taxed at yor highest bracket, will eliminate those benefits in all but the most fantastic investment opportunities.

[Anonymous]

401ks are a scam and rip off the only people making money on these are the investment fund companies http://money.cnn.com/2012/07/25/retirement/401k-fees.moneymag/index.htm

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To cut to the chase:

Investing in real estate may be a good component to returement planning. That's for each individual to decide. BUT taking money out of your 401(k) and (i) incurring the 10% penalty, and (ii) paying taxes at the presumably higher income level that you have now, as opposed to retirement, will hardly ever be a good decision. Sure, sometimes you'll strike gold, but odds are you're better off keeping the money in the tax advantaged 401k and redirective future retirement savings to real estate. If that means delayed gratification, so be it.

are you 401k consultant

No, just someone with common sense and basic math skills. Your mileage may vary.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To cut to the chase:

Investing in real estate may be a good component to returement planning. That's for each individual to decide. BUT taking money out of your 401(k) and (i) incurring the 10% penalty, and (ii) paying taxes at the presumably higher income level that you have now, as opposed to retirement, [b]will hardly ever[b] be a good decision. Sure, sometimes you'll strike gold, but odds are you're better off keeping the money in the tax advantaged 401k and redirective future retirement savings to real estate. If that means delayed gratification, so be it.

You misspelled "never."

I misspelled plenty of words, but not "never." Unless you mean to suggest that I meant to write "never" instead of "ever," in which case your grammar is worse than my typing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:401ks are a scam and rip off the only people making money on these are the investment fund companies http://money.cnn.com/2012/07/25/retirement/401k-fees.moneymag/index.htm

Well I made my first million through my 401(k). Have you made your first million yet? If so, how did you do it?

[Anonymous]

Or the "appreciation of physcial property." What does that even mean? You can drive by it and think "gee, I own that."

You have no business on this thread if you don't know what "appreciation" means in the financial sense. Go away.

[Anonymous]

Only someone really ignorant would call a 401k plan a scam. The article linked only talks about being aware of the fees your plan charges, which makes sense no matter what the investment is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:401ks are a scam and rip off the only people making money on these are the investment fund companies http://money.cnn.com/2012/07/25/retirement/401k-fees.moneymag/index.htm

Well I made my first million through my 401(k). Have you made your first million yet? If so, how did you do it?

are you 50+ years old? The younger generation got screwed by you. You will be able to retire on the backs of your children who will not be able to achieve the golden parachute of government benefits, pensions, artificial stock / housing appreciation (housing before 2005, stocks before .com crash) etc... that are not available to us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:401ks are a scam and rip off the only people making money on these are the investment fund companies http://money.cnn.com/2012/07/25/retirement/401k-fees.moneymag/index.htm

Well I made my first million through my 401(k). Have you made your first million yet? If so, how did you do it?

are you 50+ years old? The younger generation got screwed by you. You will be able to retire on the backs of your children who will not be able to achieve the golden parachute of government benefits, pensions, artificial stock / housing appreciation (housing before 2005, stocks before .com crash) etc... that are not available to us.

No, I'm 46. Go ahead and blame the Boomers. It won't make you rich.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:401ks are a scam and rip off the only people making money on these are the investment fund companies http://money.cnn.com/2012/07/25/retirement/401k-fees.moneymag/index.htm

Well I made my first million through my 401(k). Have you made your first million yet? If so, how did you do it?

are you 50+ years old? The younger generation got screwed by you. You will be able to retire on the backs of your children who will not be able to achieve the golden parachute of government benefits, pensions, artificial stock / housing appreciation (housing before 2005, stocks before .com crash) etc... that are not available to us.

No, I'm 46. Go ahead and blame the Boomers. It won't make you rich.

you bought your house and stock before 2000 huh? FYI my riches were made with starting a business not some other bs like 401k

[Anonymous]

So long as we both make money, I don't see the problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:well sort of a bad idea. IF you were able to buy a house and pay the MAXIMUM amount of points against the 401k withdraw you could deduct away most of the penalty. Try to minimize the loss by finding a way to deduct against it that tax year.

FYI we are doing this and plan to liquidate current 401k that has remained stagnant for the last 12 years. Our new plan is to continue to buy rental homes and use future income of paid off homes for retirement.[/quote

exteremely smart. This is the real way to build wealth. Only t he poors rely on their 401k, pensions, and IRAs.