If you’re 73 or older, you may be required to take a Required Minimum Distribution (RMD) before December 31. In this episode of Elevate Wealth, Deanne Rosso and Ben Hall explain what you need to know about deadlines, penalties, and planning strategies.

You’ll learn:

✅ Who must take an RMD in 2025

✅ Exceptions for first-year RMDs

✅ How to avoid penalties and minimize taxes

Need help understanding your RMD requrements? Visit elevate-wealth.com and click “Let’s Talk.”

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Do I need to take my Required Minimum Distribution before year end? The answer today on Elevate Wealth. Hey there, I'm Deanne Rosso with Elevate Wealth Advisory, and the end of the year is upon us again, and there are certain things we need to think about before December 31st. And so with me today, I have Ben Hall, our director of tax services. Welcome, Ben. Thanks, Deanne. So, Ben, is taking your Required Minimum Distribution one of those things to add to your year-end to-do list? Yeah, it actually is one of those things you want to add to your year-end to-do list, especially if you're required to take them. As we know, there are certain tax-deferred retirement accounts that people participate in, which allow you to invest and contribute to over a long number of years, but at a certain point, they're going to require you to start taking money out of those accounts. So, when you do that, you're going to have to pay taxes on it. If you're 73 years of age or older right now and you have one of those retirement accounts, you're going to be required to take your rRequired Minimum Distribution. So very important to get those in if you're required to. And some of those accounts that we're talking about include things like 401ks, traditional IRAS and 403bs. Right. So the IRS has given us this gift of tax deferral for a long period of years, generally until we're age 73, approximately. And then that's when they want us to start paying back some of those taxes they've let us defer. That's right. 73 is the magic number. Once you hit that age, you're going to be required to start taking some of that money out. And one exception is when you do turn 73. If you're turning 73 in this current year, you actually have until April 1st to make that first distribution. So you have a little bit of extra time. But you'll want to be cautious there because what'll end up happening is you'll end up with two distributions in 2026. So you want to pay attention to what tax bracket you're in because you could potentially push yourself into that higher tax bracket, which you probably don't want to do. So just be aware of that and maybe it's best to take it by the end of this current year. Okay. So, if I turn 73 this year, then I could take the RMD this year. I probably should. Or if I happen to miss it, I have an extension of time until April 1st of next year to take my first Required Minimum Distribution. That's right. And one thing I'll note is you do want to make sure you don't miss your deadline because there is a penalty involved if you do miss the deadline of up to 25% of the amount that you're supposed to take. So, very important to hit that deadline. That's a pretty hefty penalty. It is. Okay. So, we want to make sure that we take our Required Minimum Distributions, RMDs, when we're supposed to on time so we can avoid any up to a 25% penalty. Right. That's right. Awesome. Well, taking your Required Minimum Distribution is just one of those things to check off your year-end to-do list. And if you have questions about your RMDs, or anything else related to your retirement accounts, feel free to reach out to us. You can visit us at elevate-wealth.com and click "let's talk."