Are you thinking about rolling your Traditional IRAs from one financial institution to another? Or maybe you need a temporary loan for less than 60 days. Whatever the reason may be, beware, the rules have changed.
You have 60 days after the day on which you receive your distribution to complete a rollover of your traditional IRA to another IRA. The entire amount of distribution from your IRA is taxable at your ordinary income tax rate if the rollover is not completed timely. In addition, if you are under the age of 59 ½ when the distribution is made, the amount is subject to the 10% penalty.
There’s a one-year waiting rule for rollovers. Until December 31, 2014, you are permitted to make one nontaxable rollover in any 1-year period for each IRA account, meaning that after you distribute assets from your IRA and rollover any part of that amount, you cannot make another rollover from the IRA to another (or the same) IRA within one year.
For example, you have two IRAs – IRA1 and IRA 2 – and you make a tax-free rollover from IRA1 into a new IRA (IRA3). You cannot make another tax-tree rollover from IRA1 or from IRA3 into another IRA within one year. You could, however, roll IRA2 into any other IRA because you did not roll money in to or out of that account.
A late February 2014 Tax Court case (Bobrow, T.C. Memo, 2014-21) changed the one-year rule. The Tax Court ruled that the limit of one rollover per year applies on an aggregate basis not on an IRA-by IRA basis. The Internal Revenue Server announced that the new rule will not apply to any rollover that involves a distribution that occurs before January 1, 2015.