The fast, easy way to move your old 401(k)s.

It’s the technical term for when you transfer money from a 401(k) to another retirement savings account, usually an IRA. A rollover is what most people choose to do with the money they’ve saved in their 401(k) account when leaving a job. A rollover is different from a withdrawal, which is when you pull your money out of a 401(k) and pay taxes on it. A rollover is usually tax-free, though there are exceptions if you choose to roll over a traditional 401(k) to a Roth IRA (also known as a Roth conversion).

Both a 401(k) and IRA (Individual Retirement Account) are retirement accounts that help you save money in a tax-efficient way. But there are three key differences:

1. A 401(k) is provided by an employer whereas an IRA is something that you open on your own at any time (that’s why it’s an individual retirement account).
2. A 401(k) is generally used to make new contributions while an IRA is more often used to transfer 401(k) savings into when you leave a job.
3. You lose the ability to contribute to an old 401(k) when you leave your job and it can sometimes be transferred without your consent by your old employer. That can never happen with an IRA since it’s fully controlled by you and in your name.

We can help with 403(b) accounts as well! Our process is the same since they’re very similar to 401(k) accounts.

Yes, we do. If you have a Roth 401(k) we’ll help roll it over it into a Roth IRA so that you keep the same tax benefits.

The difference between Traditional and Roth accounts comes down to when you pay taxes on your money. In a Traditional account, your ongoing contributions (savings) are made before tax. For example, money going into a traditional 401(k) gets taken out of your paycheck before you pay taxes on it. That money grows over time as the investments in your 401(k) increase in value. You’ll eventually pay taxes on it when you start withdrawing it at retirement.

The opposite is true with a Roth account. Your initial contributions are made after-tax. But since you’ve paid tax up-front you don’t have to pay any tax when you start withdrawing assets at retirement.

Think of a Traditional as a tax-me-later account whereas a Roth is a tax-me-now account.

Absolutely, and it’s often a good thing to do. One of the problems with keeping multiple 401(k)s is that you’ll have different fees and investment options in each; that can make it more difficult to keep track of your investments. Consolidating into a single IRA via a rollover can make it much easier to monitor your savings and make sure your fees and investments are appropriate.

If you choose to open an IRA with one of the preferred partners on our platform then we may be compensated. This helps us keep our rollover service free for almost all of our users and allows us to provide enhanced levels of rollover service for transfers into those partners. None of those providers are ever allowed to impact the content on our site. If you’ve ever used a site like Nerdwallet, Credit Karma, or Lending Tree then you’ll be familiar with this model.

We also offer Capitalize Plus, a premium, paid service for users who want even more service & benefits, or for users who want to roll over into an IRA provider that isn’t currently a Capitalize preferred partner.