Two criteria were just noted to me about opening a Roth IRA that I wasn't aware of..... One was that you may not have a "regular" IRA already.....the other was that you must have below a certain income level. I will read other threads re: maximum income level to see if I understand that correctly (based AGI?), but as to the other existing IRA(s) -- is it correct that you may not have another and still open a Roth? Thank you!

No problem having and existing IRA funded in prior years and then opening a Roth now. Within any given year you have a max of $2,000 per individual if you meet the earned income requirements and in the Roth case do not have too much {?} income so you qualify. But the $2,000 is for all combined IRAs for a single person.... so pick regular or Roth. I guess it is possible to have a reg/Roth split but I don't see how that makes much sense from an administrative strandpoint.

It is not uncommon for folks to have a combination of Roth and regular IRAs and that some of those may be split between different brokerages or custodians.

If you have all your IRAs at one institution, you have a better chance of getting a waver of all annual fees due to the total assets. Sadly, some custodians still like to nickle and dime customers.