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A
Hi, everybody. Suzio here. Now, what is the goal of money? The goal of money is for you to be secure. And there is no better way for you to be secure than having an emergency savings account. It is essential for your financial foundation. So all of you should be participating in the ultimate opportunity savings account at Alliant Credit Union. Go to myalliant.com to find out more. And be secure.
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Welcome, everyone, to the Women and Money podcast. And everyone's smart enough to listen to KT. It is March 12, and Susie is in a state of.
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Well, let me tell you, everybody. Let me just tell you how this podcast started.
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She brought the wrong pen.
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Wait, let me tell you this, all right? So we sit down and she looks at me, she says, I don't like this pen. Get me another pen.
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No, I want the blue pen.
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All right? So I go, okay.
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And she comes. I come back with a red pen. I said, no, Susie, I want the blue one. Where is it? I said, there's blue pens everywhere. Find the blue one. She said, you get up and get it. I said, no, I'm ready.
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So in the meantime, I get her a blue pen, okay? I bring it back to her, and now she's happy. We're about to start, and she says, get those papers off the desk.
B
No, organize yourself. She has too much clutter. Susie is clutter.
A
I'm not clutter. I have a webinar after this with Queen of Clutter, with Humana, and it's important. It's a big one hour webinar. It's live, so I have all these notes about their retirement plans and everything. And now she's made me clear everything because it irritates her to see it clutter. Are you okay?
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Now I'm ready to go. Okay, everyone. March 12th, let's rock.
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Wait, wait. And then you know what she says to me earlier? Susie, you know how I know today is March 12th?
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She sat down and said, now what's today? I said, March 12th because tomorrow's Friday the 13th. Do you believe that's an auspicious unlucky day?
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What does that mean?
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Do you believe in that? Friday the 13th is an auspicious unlucky day.
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There's no such thing as an un.
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Do you think it's an auspicious. Do you think it's auspicious or unlucky? I think.
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I don't care.
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No.
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All I know is that Friday the 13th is what, Taylor Swift's favorite day? Okay, here we go. March.
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They did not tell you all of
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this it's going to be very difficult. Everybody, my first, my first reading is from Stacy, but it's not a question, of course. It's a heartfelt thank you.
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Oh, good.
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So here we're going to open with a heartfelt thank you, Susie. Stacy said, hi, Susie and kt. I wanted to send you a quick thank you. You're going to love what she has to say. I recently published a book called Project Us about a married couple rediscovering each other after their daughter leaves for college. It almost sounds like an X rated book. They rediscovering each other, she said. While writing it, I kept thinking about the cute stuff. Silly love you two share with the world. That means you and me, Susie. The playful teasing partnership and obvious respect you have for each other definitely helped inspire the tone of the relationship in the story. So Stacy is, I was going to say, like Stacy. She said she's a brand new author and just wanted to say our love is contagious.
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Thank you, Stacy.
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Good luck with us. Wasn't there a TV show called us?
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I think there's a very famous one. Something us right now. Kt. Are we going to be able to keep it together?
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I'm together. I'm ready.
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Wait, but I have to because I want to tell a little story. Can I just do that?
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Yeah.
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All right. Yesterday we go into Lowe's. Not a big deal. Wait, we go into Lowe's and we're.
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Susie never, ever, ever goes into any stores when we go out together. She waits for me in the car. I shouldn't be giving so much information. People are going to go driving around parking lots looking for you.
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So wait, so this time she says, won't you please?
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I say, come in with me, Susie, please.
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I go, okay, Katie, right? So I go into Lowe's and we're looking for this stupid umbrella stand.
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We're looking for an umbrella stand and we're in an aisle in the umbrella department and there's no one to help us, right?
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So this man, she goes and gets this man. He comes up and he's helping us and he goes, you look like Susie Orman. And I say, I am Susie Orman. And he goes, he's like, right.
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He didn't believe her.
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He refused to believe her.
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And I didn't have my phone to show and she didn't have a phone. We left.
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I never carry my phone with me up there. So. So I said, do you see these earrings? I always have these earrings on. See my necklace? That's how you know it's really me. He said, yeah, right. He refused. And I said, okay, no problem. So now we go to another part of the store because what he gave us wouldn't work. We were trying to find another solution to this umbrella problem we were having. But anyway, so we go to this
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other part, this real big guy in the aisle.
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Really big, huge. And he says to me, you look like Susie Orman. And I go, that's because I am Susie Orman.
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And he goes, no, you're not.
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Ah, no way.
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No way.
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Listen, what would Susie Orman be doing in Lowe's?
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Doing in this aisle?
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There is no way that you would be in Lowe's. And then he calls over this other guy, and he says, does that look like Susie Orman to you? And he goes, I don't know who she is. I don't know Susie Orman.
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And he said, she's like the most famous money lady in the world. And the guy looked at him and he said, what do I know about money? I just use my phone.
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All right, so anyway, so now I'm like, okay, no problem. Now we start walking out, and one by one, people were looking at me, wondering. I couldn't tell when this happens. Wondering, are you Susie Orman? And I just looked at them, and I said, no, I'm not. Anyway, so.
B
Oh, that was quite an adventure.
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I love going to Lowe's again.
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She never comes with me anywhere, but I was happy she did.
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Remember the days when I used to go in with you?
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Oh. When we would never get anything done. Everyone would ask her questions, shake her hand. Can I take a photo with you? And Susie's very respectful and loves her audience, loves her fans, loves people. And she'd always accommodate them and forget that I was there.
A
You are just mincemeat. All right, we should get to the podcast, I think.
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Okay, here is my first question. Question from Teresa.
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Yes.
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She said, hi, Susie. My sister unexpectedly passed away in 2016. I inherited her IRA, and I still have RMDs that are distributed. Can I transfer from this IRA into a Roth?
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So you cannot. Just so you know, you cannot take an inherited IRA and convert it or transfer it to. To a Roth. It cannot happen. You have to take required minimum distributions from it, and you have to pay ordinary income taxes on it. You cannot take the RMDs, by the way, much many of you think you can and directly put them in a Roth account. You cannot, because you have to have earned income. So you can take the RMDs. And if you happen to have Earned income. Because now it is your money. You could use that money to fund a contributory Roth, but you can't just put them directly in there. You cannot do that. Next question.
B
My dear love bug, this is from Sonya. Hello, Susie and KT. I'm maxing out my Roth 403 and Roth IRA contributions. Between these rent and bills, I don't have much money left over at the end of the month. Is it okay to plan to use my Roth contributions as my emergency fund? I am single, 59, have no debt, and live a fairly frugal lifestyle. What do you think, pop quizzy? Hmm? I don't have much at the end of the month. Okay. To use my Roth contributions as an emergency fund.
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Come on, we don't have much time. Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick. It's not okay.
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No.
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All right, so it is. Absolutely. You missed that, didn't you? You just missed that. Yeah, I knew you did it. Listen to me, Sonia. Not only is it okay, I have been telling people forever, if you do not have at least a 12 month emergency fund, I don't want you to miss the opportunity of being able to fund a Roth. Because you can only fund a Roth every year up to a max, and then you've lost that year if you haven't funded it. Because you can withdraw your original contributions anytime you want, without taxes or penalties, regardless of age or how long the Roth has been open. You could take your emergency fund money, contribute it to a Roth, keep it in a money market account, savings account, whatever it is within the Roth, do not invest it, and let it build and build and build. If you happen to need it, you can withdraw. Just that simple. All right.
B
Okay. From David. Hi, Susie. And KT retired at 62. Wife 63. Will be pulling out $75,000 a year for living expenses. Now, he said brokerage account balance $510,000. Roth $710,000. IRA $1,300,000. Good for him. Are we better pulling out living expenses from a brokerage account and doing a Roth conversion from for that amount? Or should we pull that amount out of our IRA and not do a Roth conversion? Thanks for your help.
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Me? I would absolutely pull it out of my ira. Why? Cause the more you can get out of your IRA right now, live on it, pay taxes on it. Cause you'd have to pay taxes on it anyway if you converted it and you're living on it. The more you let your Roth grow tax free, the more you let your investment account grow tax deferred. Possibly tax free, to the surviving spouse if one of you dies. So I would absolutely withdraw it from my taxable IRA and live on it.
B
He's got 1.3 in. Next is Sheila. She said, susie, if my sister is on all of my accounts and can access the money, why do I need a revocable trust? I'm a retired educator, 76 years old, with a teacher pension and very small assets. I own my own home, no mortgage in a city, and can pay for everything so far. Thank you.
A
Sheila, did you notice the word so far? So far? Oh, you did notice it? I did. All right. So, Sheila, listen to me and listen to me closely. You are an educator. Haven't you learned the lesson yourself that things can happen to anybody at any time if all of a sudden you become incapacitated? And, hey, you don't find that a problem whatsoever because she's on your home title with you. But you need to sell the house. Can you? No. Why? Because if you own it in joint tenancy with her, then both of you have to sign in order to sell. If you're incapacitated, you can't sign. So now she's going to have to declare you incompetent, get a conservatorship. Oh, now she has problems. From that point on, if you simply had a living revocable trust that was just in your name, Sheila, trustee for the Sheila revocable trust, dated whenever you created it. And your sister was the successor trustee, the one who would make the decisions if you couldn't make them yourself, as well as the successor beneficiary. So everything is held for your benefit while you're alive and her benefit after you have died. It wouldn't go through probate, so you don't have to worry about that. And you don't have to worry in case something happens. And now she's incapacitated and she no longer can sign for you or do anything, you now have her on all your accounts. She's not capable of taking care of you if something happens to you. Who's going to do that for you, Sheila? Who? You have to understand that what's really important and the reason why I have been harping on the fact that every single one of you should have a revocable living trust, in my opinion, for the past almost 40 years. Are you kidding me? Is because I've seen what happens when you don't. Now, maybe it will go great for you, maybe there'll be no problems, but maybe there will be go to musthavedocs.com everybody you can get the four must have documents for what? For $99 $2,500 worth of state of the art documents that you can share with your sister Sheila so she can have them as well. Next question.
B
KT okay, this is from Ashley. She said, hi susie. I'm a 63 year old widow who recently was laid off from from $100,000 a year job. And she said I'm now making $60,000. Half of that is Social Security. I can survive on this. I have no debt. I own my condo, car, et cetera. I have 800,000 in investments and my condo is worth half a million dollars. And now Ashley said she has a dilemma. Should I move to another state to live with and take care of my 87 year old mom in her home? I honestly don't want to go back to my hometown but financially it would be amazing. I could invest most of my income while living there. Also, my mother has a lot of money. This part really made me laugh and reminds me that my inheritance may be spent if she moves to a retirement home. Good on you mama. I'm afraid I won't have enough to retire on and feel pressure to go. Susie, I would love to hear your thoughts on this. What do you think Katie?
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What would you tell her?
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I'd say if, well first of all she said she just doesn't want to go back to her hometown but living with her mom financially would be amazing. She didn't say anything about I'd love to go back and take care of mommy. She didn't say that. Yeah, she's a little selfish. Ashley, you're thinking about yourself and your
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mom is not necessarily selfish.
B
All right, well that's being honest. She's being honest. But I also like that her mom is being honest and kind of threatening her.
A
Yeah, well that would make me not want to go.
B
Well, I think that she should do it. Just go and try it. But I think she's looking for a way to save a whole lot of money right now.
A
All right, so here's what she's 63.
B
Ashley.
A
So here's what I would tell you, Ashley. Once you do this, it's done. You're going to be there. All right. So I would give it time. If it is true that you can live on the $60,000 a year, no problem and let the $800,000 in investments grow. Plus your condo is worth 500,000 and you own it outright, your car and everything you own outright, you have $1.3 million that is growing and growing. That could easily generate for you besides your pension and everything, another 50, 70, possibly $80,000 as you get older. If you had to, you could do a reverse. There's all kinds of things that you could do. So I do not want you to go back and live at your mother's because of the money you could save. She'll feel that, you'll feel it, you'll start to regret it. I would want you to go back because you want to spend time with your mom. You want to be able to help her during her later years. But if you don't have that kind of relationship with her, I'm sorry. It's not enough then for you to go back because she'll end up being miserable as well. And if she has a lot of money and she can afford it, she can hire caretakers, she can do whatever she wants. You can live your life, you can go visit her, you could leave and all of that. Now I'm going to be really honest with you. There is no way that I personally could have moved in. Really Katie, you know this is true. To take care of my mother, if I needed money, whatever, I still couldn't have done it because I didn't have that kind of relationship with her at the very end. I loved her very much but I could not have done a kt on the other hand absolutely could have done it. And thank God I had the money, Ashley to provide that for my mother to give her full time aids to make sure she was comfortable to go and visit her when I could. Your mother's taking care of that for herself. So if I were you, I have to tell you I would stay exactly where I am. People first that means you Ashley, then money, then things. You would only be going there for money and to get a big inheritance. Wrong in my opinion. Next question. Katie.
B
Okay, this is from Sue. Sue said my friend, age 70, most recently attended an elder seminar. So this is what her friend was told. If you have a revocable trust, the five year look back for Medicaid paid to long term care does not count. There needs to be at least 5 years where your assets are in an irrevocable trust.
A
Go on.
B
Right, so now. Well she's just asking.
A
No, I'm not mad at her.
B
Please do an Susie Orman school on the topic. We need expert advice before some salesman wanting money leads us down the wrong path.
A
Let's just do a really quick Susie school here. What is the Medicaid five year look back when someone applies For Medicaid to pay for long term care such as a nursing home, the government looks back five years from the date of the application because they want to review all transfers KT of your money to make sure that you didn't give it all away right away, right before this happened, just so you could qualify for Medicaid. If you gave money away, transferred property or moved assets into certain Trusts during that 5 year window, Medicaid may impose a penalty period KT where they will not pay for care. Everybody needs to know that. So the five year look back is real. But here is the important part. Many seminar presenters like this one throw around the word trust without really explaining the difference between a revocable and an irrevocable trust. The truth is, in a revocable living trust, you still own and control the assets. You can change or revoke it anytime because you still control it. Medicaid counts those assets as yours. A revocable trust does not protect assets from Medicaid. That is true. That is not why you get a revocable trust trust. However, an irrevocable trust, once your assets are placed into it, they're no longer yours. Everybody. You generally cannot take them back. And because of that loss of control, those assets may not count towards Medicaid eligibility after the five year look back. But that isn't what you want to do. That's not how you want to live your life. Everybody. Also, when you have something, when you have assets KT in an irrevocable trust, again, you can't change it, you lose access to it. And the rules vary by state. So here's the thing. You are not to listen to that because the goal is not for you to protect your money so that you end up in a nursing home on Medicaid. Do you have any idea the difference between care on Medicaid and care as a private pay patient? If this person had any integrity, they would have said you should look into getting a long term care insurance policy or let's protect your money in terms of investing it so that you have enough money to pay privately. If you happen to go in to a nursing home, but you do not want to go into a Medicaid situation to go into a Medicaid. I just have to say one last thing. To go into a Medicaid payment, you have to go into a Medicare approved nursing home. And little by little they are getting rid of those because they don't want to have to pay for you. So don't lose control over your money. So simply so that the five year look back period may get you. No. If you spend down all your money to take care of yourself, okay, then you go into Medicaid legitimately. But don't go hiding your money just so you get to go on Medicaid. All right, go on kt.
B
So, Susie, my last question's from Robby B. I love this Robby b. I'm a 48 year old female who is currently employed. My question is how much of my savings should be placed in a high yield dividend account in approximately 10 and a half years when I retire from my current employer, I will be collecting a pension as well as money in a deferred compensation account. And then she said, I'm just concerned I have too much money in my high yield dividend account rather than having more in my regular savings account through my bank. Is it too much of a gamble? So what would you tell Robbie B.
A
Robbie B. I can tell you that how could you even think about having any money at a savings account in a bank paying you what, 0.9% of that? Like, what are you talking about? You are 48 years of age. As long as you have a 12 month emergency fund somewhere, hopefully where it makes sense, a Lion Credit union, at a money market account, at a brokerage firm, wherever you want to put it, paying you the highest possible interest rate, but not at a bank. That is what should be keeping you up at night, number one. Number two, you are 48. Maybe you'll retire at 58, but by the time you're 58, maybe you'll go, why would I do that? Why wouldn't I want to work for another 10 years and keep making more money and having my money billed and on and on and on. So right now you want your money invested for growth. Hopefully you are investing in Roth retirement accounts, not traditional ones. So if you want to be conservative, okay, you want it in high yield dividend stocks and things like that. I don't have a problem with that. I don't think you could have too much money in it if that's what you're wanting. I hope you also have some money in the Standard and Poor's 500 indexes or things that give you a little bit more of total growth. But no, don't do what you were thinking of doing. Hi, Katie.
B
Hi. That's a wrap.
A
Katie, just tell everybody how much fun we've had the past few weeks.
B
Oh my goodness. I told you the month of March Susie turned into a social animal.
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Animal.
B
We've been going to concerts and plays and I mean dancing, everything.
A
And I don't know if I've already said this to you. We went and we saw Pink Martini and Storm Large performed with Pink Martini. She is without a shadow of a doubt, right kt, the most incredible performer I have ever seen in my life. We went to see other things as well. Just the other night we were in Misery. You were with Patti LuPone in all. Loved it, loved it. Like she was fabulous, everybody. And very shortly we're going to see a comedian and then we're going to see Matt.
B
Oh, Jimmy.
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Jimmy Buffett's guy, Nick McNeilly. Nick McNally who wrote everything with Jimmy. And we're going to go with Cynthia. I can't wait to see him, Jimmy's daughter.
B
We're going to sing Jimmy songs, right?
A
But I keep going, where can we go? What can we do?
B
So now we're sitting around and all of a sudden we're watching the news and a commercial came on for an ice skating, an ice skating rink, you know, big show I think with all the stars that were in the Olympics or all the oly know skaters. And so I look turned around, I looked at Susie and her face was lit up like a 5 year old wanting to go see them skate. So we'll probably go see that.
A
Yeah, baby, we're living now. All right, so until Sunday when I have absolutely no idea of what we're going or I'm going to be doing. There's only one thing that we want you to remember when it comes to your money. What is that?
B
Kt? People first, then money, then things and
A
then pens that have a blue little strip around it. Until next week, please stay safe. Bye bye.
B
Bye.
D
We are strong, we are wise we will not apologize we are here we will thrive Together we will rise Everything it takes we are strong we are wise Together we will rise.
A
Hi everybody. Suzy O here and I have to tell all of you there is one benefit that I know all of you need and your corporations need to offer. And it comes from a company that I help co found over five years ago by the name of Secure Save. So whether you're an employee or an employer, I want you to go to securesave.com Suzie S U Z E and take a look at what I have for you there. I promise you you're going to like it.
C
All right now neither Suze Orman Media nor Suze Orman is acting as a certified financial planner advisor, a certified financial analyst, an economist, CP accountant or lawyer. Neither Suze Orman Media nor Suze Orman make any recommendations as to any specific securities or investments. All content contained in this podcast is for informational and general purposes only and does not constitute financial, accounting or legal advice. You should consult your own tax, legal and financial advisors regarding your particular situation. Neither Suze Orman Media nor Suze Orman accepts any responsibility for any losses which may arise from accessing or or reliance on information in this podcast and to the fullest extent permitted by law, we exclude all liability for loss damages, direct or indirect, arising from the use of this information. The must have documents discussed in this podcast are legal documents created by a lawyer and distributed by Hay House. Thanks for listening.
Podcast: Suze Orman's Women & Money (And Everyone Smart Enough To Listen)
Episode: Can I Transfer From an Inherited IRA to My Roth?
Date: March 12, 2026
Length: ~30 minutes
Host: Suze Orman (A), with KT (B)
This episode dives into community questions on inherited IRAs, Roth conversions, using Roth IRAs for emergencies, living trust essentials, Medicaid planning, and retirement investment strategies. Interwoven with listener stories, Suze and KT’s candid banter, and tales from their personal lives, the podcast emphasizes the importance of financial security, clarity on trusts, and putting people before money.
[00:56-07:20] Suze and KT open with playful banter about pens, clutter, and preparations for a webinar.
Story: Suze recounts her adventure at Lowe’s, not being recognized despite being a famous financial expert. Their dynamic partnership inspires a listener to write a book (“Project Us” by Stacy).
“You are just mincemeat. All right, we should get to the podcast, I think.”
— Suze Orman [07:20]
Listener: Teresa
[07:24-08:39]
Question: Can you transfer or convert an inherited IRA to a Roth IRA?
Suze’s Answer:
“You cannot take an inherited IRA and convert it or transfer it to a Roth. It cannot happen.”
— Suze Orman [07:46]
Listener: Sonya
[08:39-10:40]
Question: Is it okay to use Roth contributions as an emergency fund if you’re maxing out retirement contributions but cash is tight?
Suze’s Advice:
“Not only is it okay, I have been telling people forever... you can withdraw your original contributions anytime you want, without taxes or penalties.”
— Suze Orman [09:32]
Listener: David
[10:40-11:52]
Question: With considerable assets, is it better to pull living expenses from a brokerage account and do a Roth conversion, or just withdraw from the IRA?
Suze’s Strategy:
“The more you let your Roth grow tax free, the more you let your investment account grow tax deferred... I would absolutely withdraw it from my taxable IRA and live on it.”
— Suze Orman [11:20]
Listener: Sheila
[11:52-14:52]
Question: Is a revocable living trust necessary if a trusted relation is a joint account holder?
Suze’s Detailed Lesson:
“Things can happen to anybody at any time... If you simply had a living revocable trust... it wouldn’t go through probate.”
— Suze Orman [12:16]
Listener: Ashley
[14:52-19:55]
Question: Recently laid off and considering moving in with an elderly mother for financial security—should she do it if she doesn’t want to?
Suze’s Honest Reflection:
“I do not want you to go back and live at your mother’s because of the money you could save... You would only be going there for money and to get a big inheritance. Wrong in my opinion.”
— Suze Orman [18:51]
Listener: Sue (on behalf of a friend)
[19:55-24:27]
Question: Does establishing a revocable (or irrevocable) trust shield assets from Medicaid’s five-year look-back?
Suze School:
“Don’t lose control over your money so simply... the five year look-back period may get you. No... Don’t go hiding your money just so you get to go on Medicaid.”
— Suze Orman [23:45]
Listener: Robby B
[24:27-26:54]
Question: Is having too much money in a high-yield dividend account versus regular bank savings a risk prior to retirement?
Suze’s Direct Take:
“How could you even think about having any money at a savings account in a bank paying you what, 0.9%?”
“You are 48. Maybe you’ll retire at 58, but... why wouldn’t I want to work for another 10 years and keep making more money...”
— Suze Orman [25:10]
Suze and KT close with upbeat stories about social outings and Suze’s newfound love for concerts and performances, ending with a signature reminder:
“People first, then money, then things.”
— Suze Orman & KT [28:43]
For more details, access Suze’s “must-have documents” at musthavedocs.com and explore emergency savings options at MyAlliant.com.