You can make contributions to your Roth IRA after you turn 70½. You can leave amounts in your Roth IRA for as long as you live. The account or annuity must be designated as a Roth IRA when set up. There's no age limit for opening a Roth IRA, but there are income and contribution limits that investors should be aware of before funding one.
Additionally, some investors may consider converting their IRA to gold, which is known as 'Converting IRA to Gold'.Let's look at the pros and cons. The RMD directive ensures that you pay taxes on your savings after enjoying years of tax-deferred growth. As you might have guessed, Roth IRAs are the only accounts that don't require minimum distributions at any age. Since these accounts are funded with after-tax money, Uncle Sam won't benefit from your withdrawals.
This, of course, assumes that you comply with the “qualified retirement rules” established by the IRS. As noted above, the IRS doesn't allow contributions to a traditional IRA after age 70 and a half, so a Roth is your only IRA option after that age. A Roth IRA might be better than a traditional IRA for people who want to save on taxes in retirement when they expect to earn more later than they do now. If you have a significant amount of money in traditional IRAs, converting some of that money into Roth money will not only help you avoid mandatory minimum distributions (RMDs), but it will also help your heirs keep more of the money you leave them by not requiring them to pay taxes on their traditional IRA that they inherited during their potentially higher income years.
If you don't plan to stop working by the time you reach retirement age, you may want to continue making IRA contributions. The distribution rules of a Roth IRA can also help you if you intend to leave your IRA to your heirs. Even people with high incomes who can't directly fund a Roth IRA can use this strategy, also known as a clandestine Roth IRA. However, you can still contribute to a Roth IRA and make cumulative contributions to a Roth or traditional IRA, regardless of your age.
Keep in mind that those who are 70 and a half years old or older and make contributions to a traditional IRA, a SIMPLE IRA, or an SEP IRA will continue to have to apply for an RMD, even if they are still working. Just as you can only contribute to your IRA until you reach a certain age, most IRAs impose the required minimum distributions (RMDs) once you turn 70.5 or 72, depending on your date of birth.
