- Nov 8, 2012
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Hello ATOT -
Looking for some financial advice of sorts. I'm guessing a lot of people won't be able to relate to this, since very few companies still have a pension.
Backstory:
For around 7 years I worked for Big 4 accounting firms, which are some of the few companies that still offer a pension. With my last firm I stayed around for about 4.5 years, which was sufficient enough to be vested in the pension fund. The way the pension works is that it is 100% contributed to by the company - none of it is my dollars deducted from my paycheck.
Overall, the contribution is mere peanuts. You get roughly 2% or 3% of your yearly paycheck contributed to every year, the percentage amount goes up every 5 years or so for the few that can actually stand the shitty work environment for that long.
So after 4 years, I'm looking at 12k for contributions + interest over the years. For what it's worth, from what I can grasp it's looking like the interest it earns yearly is... 3.8% from 2017 , and roughly similar for 2018. So it's not exactly high baller interest. I also have no control over the investments obviously since it's a pension and not a 401k/IRA. At the same time, to my knowledge I don't believe there are any fees. Since I'm no longer employed with I will obviously not be getting any additional credits to the account aside from the interest earned.
So the question now is what to do with these funds? I just received a notice of my options which are basically:
1) Leave it alone, let it grow in interest until I can withdraw during retirement
2) Roll over to one of my IRAs/401ks
3) Cash out - and pay taxes + penalties (lol won't do this).
Anyone with knowledge in pension funds have a recommendation?
Looking for some financial advice of sorts. I'm guessing a lot of people won't be able to relate to this, since very few companies still have a pension.
Backstory:
For around 7 years I worked for Big 4 accounting firms, which are some of the few companies that still offer a pension. With my last firm I stayed around for about 4.5 years, which was sufficient enough to be vested in the pension fund. The way the pension works is that it is 100% contributed to by the company - none of it is my dollars deducted from my paycheck.
Overall, the contribution is mere peanuts. You get roughly 2% or 3% of your yearly paycheck contributed to every year, the percentage amount goes up every 5 years or so for the few that can actually stand the shitty work environment for that long.
So after 4 years, I'm looking at 12k for contributions + interest over the years. For what it's worth, from what I can grasp it's looking like the interest it earns yearly is... 3.8% from 2017 , and roughly similar for 2018. So it's not exactly high baller interest. I also have no control over the investments obviously since it's a pension and not a 401k/IRA. At the same time, to my knowledge I don't believe there are any fees. Since I'm no longer employed with I will obviously not be getting any additional credits to the account aside from the interest earned.
So the question now is what to do with these funds? I just received a notice of my options which are basically:
1) Leave it alone, let it grow in interest until I can withdraw during retirement
2) Roll over to one of my IRAs/401ks
3) Cash out - and pay taxes + penalties (lol won't do this).
Anyone with knowledge in pension funds have a recommendation?