The Money Mustache Community
Learning, Sharing, and Teaching => Ask a Mustachian => Topic started by: VeggieTable on January 21, 2017, 02:12:22 PM
-
Hi, all - I have a question about contributing to an IRA when not working. For some background, I have a son who is almost 2.5, and I have worked off and on since he was born. So far I have worked a little during every calendar year, so I've been able to contribute to an IRA without issue. This is the first year when I may not work at all. If I do, it won't be until much later in the year, so I'm just operating under the assumption that I'll SAH all of 2017.
I've been looking for resources on spousal IRAs and I'm not finding much that's current. Thought I'd ask this very intelligent group of people and see if anyone has experience with this. From what I've found, it looks like I *can* contribute to an IRA while not working (or at least, my husband can contribute for me). The question is, do I need to set up a new account? I have a Roth IRA with Vanguard, which I opened after discovering MMM last year. I've since rolled over most of my old retirement accounts from various jobs into it. Is that sufficient, or do I need another one?
Thanks for any insight you can offer.
-
As long as you and your spouse earn at least $11k combined, you can both contribute the full $5.5k to an IRA. You can use the same IRA account you've always used.
-
Yep, what seattlecyclone said. My wife went FIRE several years before me and we always tried to max out both my and her Roths.
-
Thank you! Glad to know there's at least one retirement option open for me.