Termination of IRA

[Guest Stevo]

I currently have a Roth IRA with a brokerage company. I am dissatisfied with the way the company handles my account and would like to terminate with them. How can I "take control" of the mutual fund stock in my account?

[BPickerCPA]

You can always move your IRA account to another custodian. The IRA must be in the control of an IRS recognized custodian, but most brokers allow you to control your own investments.

If the mutual fund that your IRA is invested in is proprietary to the broker, then you would have to sell the fund within the IRA with the broker, and then you could do a trustee to trustee of the cash to another custodian. Do not take actual possession of the funds. Only transfer it in trustee to trustee transfers.

If you know where you want to move the IRA account to, go there first to open the account and they will help you with the transfer. Good luck.

[John G]

Examine your mutual fund account rules very carefully before acting. If you have a generic no-load fund (like Janus, Twentieth Century or T Rowe) you are probably going to have no problem. But, if you have a brokerage based fund find out how it might be sold. Some brokerage supported funds have back end loads and you might want to avoid them by waiting a few years (if the load decays over time). Some firms also like to hit you with a termination fee (I have seen some as high as $50).

Barry is right on the mechanics, definitely use trustee to trustee direct transfer route.