You should read through the topics in the "Windfall" portion of the Personal Finance Wiki. Not all of it is applicable to your situation, but it will help you get started in the right direction:

https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/wiki/windfall/

Start here: https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/wiki/commontopics

Yo with that much, if you aren't sure what you're doing, you need a fiduciary advisor.

Unfortunately no one has a crystal ball that can see the future of the housing market, as much as they may pretend to.

Your options are:

1. Buy with less than 20% down, take PMI, and hope interest rates don’t keep going up, and refinance out of the PMI in a few years

2. Enjoy your low-rent situation for a while longer, continue building that down payment fund, and hope prices don’t continue rising and that interest rates start going back down

3. Do your original idea of emptying your IRAs, take the 10% penalty plus the additional tax burden, plus the opportunity cost of having significantly reduced your retirement investments, potentially pushing your retirement years further out.

I can’t tell you which one is right, personal finance is personal after all. But for me, I think the 3rd option is the one with the biggest downsides.

We have a gun safe in the basement where we store those sorts of things.

Scan them at the best resolution (because when you need a replacement or just a quick look, a copy helps) and store the originals in a bolted-down fire safe. The safe doesn't have to be in your room where valuables are expected.

>Plus I have a small fear that we would lose the combination

Put it in your password manager.

So, if the 1099 shows a distribution of that amount, it either:

- got moved to an IRA account, or

- got moved to an entirely new 401(k) provider, which is the most likely.

It's on you to stay on top of important mail, and this includes notifying vendors of a new address, and using the USPS change-of-address kit to both forward your mail and notify senders. A lot of important mail is sent in such a way that the sender is notified if you have a change-of-address on file.

I get mail addressed to some guy at my address several times a year from Empower, a 401(k) administrator. He's got money out there that he has evidently completely lost track of.

Thank you! This is really helpful. We do have really good credit so I think we will get a good PMI rate. What concerns me is a higher monthly payment due to a lower down payment with the cost of living going up (groceries, preschool, etc) . I am wondering if we would pay more in the long run on interest than any tax hit we'd get on our IRA's if we put 20% down.

I keep them in my 500 lb fireproof safe.

You're likely better off with a lower down payment with PMI. I know when I first started looking the estimates from Zillow and the like went way over on PMI estimates, something like 225/month and it ended up actually being 60/month, which is very little compared to the taxation and penalty on an early IRA withdrawal.

Worst case, maybe reduce contributions to the IRA temporarily for cash flow with the mortgage, but avoid withdrawal if at all possible, or better yet, tighten up your budget on other aspects if they aren't necessary expenses.

I have one, they were beating the average rate quite well a couple years ago. Right now not so much but they're good enough. No catches, no issues besides trying to figure out how to add my wife to the account... still haven't figured that out.

In a fireproof lockbox with in a fireproof envelope in the back of a closet. I assume thieves will try to steal something smaller and more valuable before they find and take this.

It only matters if your state gives tax breaks for 529 contributions.

Would it be more advisable to put less than 20% down then? Seems like the longer we wait, the more housing costs keep going up.

You don’t seem concerned about being in the hook so I won’t regurgitate that part . But the other side of what you’re asking….If you want a loan or run a credit check, they will show that you have debt. Which means lower chance of getting a loan

Balance is/was roughly ~$75,000.

Withdrawing early from an IRA is a double whammy of bad. First, you’ll have to pay income taxes on it when you file your 2023 taxes. Second, you take a 10% penalty.

This is not advisable.

If your account was < $1000 they likely cut you a check and you had 60 days to roll it over to an IRA.

If your account > $1000 but < $5000, they already moved it to an IRA.

If your account > $5000 they are generally required to leave it alone, unless the entire plan was terminated for some reason.

How much was the "entire amount" on the 1099?

Are they solid on price though? Do they try to charge you extra fees or is it straight taxes and plate fee

On the other hand, you get really cheap leverage on your down payment, a 30 yr mortgage is a spectacular deal (lots of upside of rates go up, no downside if rates go down since you can refinance), and big govt subsidies (mortgages are subsidized plus multiple significant tax breaks for homeowner)

You may find these links helpful:

• Retirement Accounts
• "How to handle $"

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Yes, and it’s the best car buying experience I’ve had, by far. I didn’t know until a friend told me about it. It’s pretty great.

10% penalty on top of the normal taxes due…so more like 30% is worst case

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