{"id":14757,"date":"2020-06-05T18:53:24","date_gmt":"2020-06-05T23:53:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sfwpartnersllc.com\/?p=14757"},"modified":"2020-06-05T18:53:24","modified_gmt":"2020-06-05T23:53:24","slug":"a-nonworking-spouse-can-still-have-an-ira","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sfw.cpa\/news-and-guides\/a-nonworking-spouse-can-still-have-an-ira\/","title":{"rendered":"A Nonworking Spouse Can Still Have an IRA"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><html><head><\/head><body><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/snd-store\/a\/47541659\/06_02_20_503885290_itb_560x292.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s often difficult for married couples to save as much as they need for retirement when one spouse doesn\u2019t work outside the home \u2014 perhaps so that spouse can take care of children or elderly parents. In general, an IRA contribution is allowed only if a taxpayer has compensation. However, an exception involves a \u201cspousal\u201d IRA. It allows a contribution to be made for a nonworking spouse.<\/p>\n<p>Under the spousal IRA rules, the amount that a married couple can contribute to an IRA for a nonworking spouse in 2020 is $6,000, which is the same limit that applies for the working spouse.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Two main benefits<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>As you may be aware, IRAs offer two types of benefits for taxpayers who make contributions to them.<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Contributions of up to $6,000 a year to an IRA may be tax deductible.<\/li>\n<li>The earnings on funds within the IRA are not taxed until withdrawn. (Alternatively, you may make contributions to a Roth IRA. There\u2019s no deduction for Roth IRA contributions, but, if certain requirements are met, distributions are tax-free.)<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>As long as the couple together has at least $12,000 of earned income, $6,000 can be contributed to an IRA for each, for a total of $12,000. (The contributions for both spouses can be made to either a regular IRA or a Roth IRA, or split between them, as long as the combined contributions don\u2019t exceed the $12,000 limit.)<\/p>\n<p><strong>Catching up<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In addition, individuals who are age 50 or older can make \u201ccatch-up\u201d contributions to an IRA or Roth IRA in the amount of $1,000. Therefore, in 2020, for a taxpayer and his or her spouse, both of whom will have reached age 50 by the end of the year, the combined limit of the deductible contributions to an IRA for each spouse is $7,000, for a combined deductible limit of $14,000.<\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s one catch, however. If, in 2020, the working spouse is an active participant in either of several types of retirement plans, a deductible contribution of up to $6,000 (or $7,000 for a spouse who will be 50 by the end of the year) can be made to the IRA of the non-participant spouse only if the couple\u2019s AGI doesn\u2019t exceed $104,000. This limit is phased out for AGI between $196,000 and $206,000.<\/p>\n<p>Contact us if you\u2019d like more information about IRAs or you\u2019d like to discuss retirement planning.<\/p>\n<p><em>\u00a9 2020<\/em><\/p>\n<p><\/body><br \/>\n<\/html><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s often difficult for married couples to save as much as they need for retirement when one spouse doesn\u2019t work outside the home \u2014 perhaps so that spouse can take care of children or elderly parents. In general, an IRA contribution is allowed only if a taxpayer has compensation. However, an exception involves a \u201cspousal\u201d [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":14756,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[24],"class_list":["post-14757","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-individual-tax"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sfw.cpa\/news-and-guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14757","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sfw.cpa\/news-and-guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sfw.cpa\/news-and-guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sfw.cpa\/news-and-guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sfw.cpa\/news-and-guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14757"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.sfw.cpa\/news-and-guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14757\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sfw.cpa\/news-and-guides\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sfw.cpa\/news-and-guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14757"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sfw.cpa\/news-and-guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14757"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sfw.cpa\/news-and-guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14757"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}