Trust me, I do this every day

A client told me he had recently changed jobs and asked if I would roll over his 401(k)—into an existing Roth account. I asked if he knew whether his original 401(k) had been a traditional, or a Roth. Was he sure?

He was a little gruff at my complicating something so simple. But I really encouraged him to call his 401(k) company and verify it, first. Because I suspected it was most likely a traditional 401(k)—which would have rather large tax ramifications for him that he wasn’t considering.

Wouldn’t you know it? He called me—on my day off. It had indeed been a traditional 401(k) and I had just saved him a costly mistake. I came into work and opened a traditional IRA for him right then.