Use your Retirement Plan to Fund your Startup

First of all, I won’t advise anyone to withdraw their 401(k) funds early as the tax hit the IRS enacts is insane.  If you are thinking about doing that, please don’t, or at least don’t do so until you’ve spoken to your accountant.

This post will, however, detail how to use your qualified retirement plan or IRA to start a new, or buy an existing, business.  This name given to the process I’ll discuss is rollovers as business startups (“ROBS”).  The main gist is that an individual’s current retirement plan is rolled over into a newly established 401(k) plan sponsored by a startup company and then used to purchase the startup company’s stock.  The ROBS arrangement allows income taxes and penalties (see IRC Section 72(t))to be avoided because it is a rollover from one qualified plan to another. Read more