The question of which investment accounts you should tap first in retirement can often be a tricky one. But it gets even trickier if your goal is to leave money to heirs.
How do you balance retirement with your estate planning goals? After all, even if you plan to leave it all to your heirs, you still need to be sure you can take care of yourself to the end. What assets should you spend down first and how should you do so to maximize both end-of-life comfort and the inheritance to leave behind?
The Wall Street Journal pegs the solution in an article titled “The Most Valuable Assets to Leave for Your Heirs.” In the article there’s a strong case for the Roth IRA, and you may have heard the fanfare already. These accounts have been around for a while, but it has only been in the past few years, with the modification of a few laws, that they have become available to just about everyone. In fact, even traditional IRAs can be converted to one.