qualifications for employers.....

[Guest SprinklerGuy]

I did not search.....sorry.

I have a small company, 4 employees 2 of which are my wife and I. S-Corporation.

I want to contribute as much as possible to a retirement vehicle.

Do I qualify for 401k and if so, how do I go about it?

Should I just do an IRA for each of us or what would be best?

Thanks in advance

[david rigby]

...as much as possible...

What neighborhood are we in here?

What are ages of plan participants?

[Mike Preston]

You need to contact somebody that handles small plans. Have a Yellow Pages handy? You will want that person to have some credentials that indicate they understand the types of plans that you can enter into. Ask what they have and then post back indicating what they are and somebody will provide you with a description of what those credentials mean.

The person you end up talking to must ask you for a complete listing of what you pay your employees (including yourself and your spouse for this purpose). They should ask your birth dates and the hire dates. They should ask how many hours each employee works in a given year. They should ask how much you can afford to save over and above the amounts you are paying, or are willing to pay, yourself and your spouse. They will ask how much of your income you have historically taken as "pass through dividends". They will ask what year you are talking about saving money on behalf of (2003 or 2004).

If they don't ask all those questions then they don't have enough knowledge to provide you with the choices that you should have.

Good luck.

[Guest SprinklerGuy]

Wife 37 myself 36

would like to contribute 6k each per year.

[Lame Duck]

If you are looking to contribute only $6,000 each on behalf of you and your spouse, you might want to consider a Simple IRA. it will allow you and your spouse to each defer $6,000 from your salaries. It would require some form of contribution, either matchng or nondiscretionary for all employees. You will need to take this into consideration when adopting the plan.

[Blinky the 3-eyed Fish]

You really should take Mike's advice and call someone. You still don't provide enough information to tell you want is the best and frankly, you shouldn't on these Message Boards.

[Lame Duck]

Blinky,

In my mind it's a foregone conclusion that someone would follow Mike's advice. I was only suggesting a possible alternative that might not be mentioned by a plan consultant. Not all of them are as reputable and honest as the members here.

[Mike Preston]

Lame Duck is right on in this case. I don't think emphasizing that a SIMPLE IRA is a potential alternative is a bad thing. I know that *I* don't run across many plans that lend themselves to SIMPLE's of any sort and it could very well be that the more experienced the person the less likely they are to have familiarity with options that are, well, simple.

And sometimes they ARE the best alternatives for the client.

In this case, though, I seriously doubt it, although it depends on how many hours the employees work for sprinklerguy and when they were hired.

It is starting to look like a SEP-IRA may make the most sense, especially if the employees have been with sprinklerguy for less than 3 years and sprinklerguy has been in business for longer than that. Ah, census. So easy when you have it available. So difficult when it isn't.