If you have a traditional IRA or 401(k), the IRS has already circled a birthday on your calendar: the year you turn 73. That’s when Required Minimum Distributions kick in and Uncle Sam starts dictating the minimum you pull out (and pay tax on) every year for the rest of your life. What almost nobody tells you: the roughly ten years before that (your 60s into age 72) is a tax-planning window you fully control, and it’s the single most valuable stretch of your retirement for cutting a lifetime tax bill.
The Window Hiding in Plain Sight
Once wages stop and before Social Security and RMDs stack on top of each other, your taxable income usually collapses. That temporary valley is your chance to voluntarily pull money out of pretax accounts, or convert it to a Roth, at bracket rates you may never see again. Every dollar you move now is a dollar the IRS can’t force out at 73 at whatever rate applies then.
The Rule That Made This Window Bigger
The RMD start age is set by Internal Revenue Code Section 401(a)(9). The SECURE 2.0 Act of 2022 (Section 107) pushed that age from 72 to 73 effective January 1, 2023, and it moves again to 75 in 2033 for anyone born in 1960 or later. That extra runway is real. Congress literally gave you more untaxed years to work with, and the default plan (do nothing and let the balance grow) is often the worst one.
Who This Actually Helps
This window is built for you if you have meaningful balances in traditional IRAs, 401(k)s, 403(b)s, or SEPs, and you’re between roughly age 60 and 72. It’s especially powerful if you’ve retired but haven’t started Social Security, or if you’re delaying benefits to 70 to lock in the roughly 8% annual delayed retirement credit. It does not help much if you’re already in the top bracket, if nearly all your savings are already in a Roth, or if you’ll need the money within five years of a conversion (the Roth five-year clock will bite).
How to Actually Use the Decade
- Map your bracket. Estimate taxable income for the year. The goal is to “fill up” the 12% or 22% bracket (or 24%, depending on your situation) with intentional income, not blow past it.
- Do partial Roth conversions. Roth conversions have no income limit under IRC Section 408A. Convert only up to the top of your target bracket, pay the tax from a taxable account if possible, and repeat annually.
- Delay Social Security, spend the IRA first. Drawing down the traditional balance in your 60s shrinks the future RMD base and lets your Social Security check grow.
- Start Qualified Charitable Distributions at 70½. Under IRC Section 408(d)(8), you can send IRA money straight to charity, up to an inflation-adjusted cap ($108,000 in 2025, indexed for 2026), and it never hits your AGI. Once RMDs begin, QCDs count toward them.
- Coordinate with today’s rates. The 2026 Social Security COLA is 2.8%, and the CPI sits at 332.6. Inflation-indexed brackets are wider than they were five years ago, so more conversion fits under the same rate.
The Catch Nobody Circles
Roth conversions are irrevocable. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act killed “recharacterization” in 2018, so once you convert, you owe the tax, period. Two more traps: any conversion has its own five-year clock before earnings come out tax-free, and boosting your AGI can spike Medicare Part B and D premiums two years later through IRMAA surcharges. It can also drag more of your Social Security into the taxable zone, which is why even the modest 1.68% national 12-month CD yield matters when you decide where the tax money comes from.
The default is to let the balance ride and let the IRS write the withdrawal schedule at 73. The quiet rule inside your own account says you don’t have to.
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