Journey to Multifamily Millions

Invest in More Real Estate with a Solo401k with Ilana Brown, Ep 94

• Tim • Season 1 • Episode 94

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Episode Summary

Today's guest is  Ilana Brown,  who is a sales and account manager at Solo401k.com 

In this episode, Ilana Brown from solo401k.com explains how these tools offer investors greater control over their retirement funds, enabling investment in a wide range of assets such as real estate, cryptocurrencies, and private equities. 

She discusses the requirements for setting up a solo 401k, the importance of qualifying for it, and the process of funding and investing through these accounts. Key considerations like prohibited transactions, contribution limits, and handling business growth are elaborated to ensure investors make informed decisions. 

She also answers common questions and pitfalls in managing self-directed retirement accounts, emphasizing the importance of compliance and strategic planning for maximizing retirement savings. Stay tuned!


Episode Topics

[01:20]  Meet our guest, Ilana Brown
[03:57] Investment Opportunities and Qualifications for Solo 401k
[11:35] Exploring the Checkbook IRA LLC Option
[16:19] Q&A Session: Navigating Solo 401k and Self-Directed IRA Options
[2023] Understanding Prohibited Transactions and IRS Guidelines
[24:37] Addressing Common Mistakes and IRS Compliance
[28:28] Transitioning from Solo 401k to Self-Directed IRA with Employees
[31:24] Closing Remarks and Future Sessions


Notable Quotes

  • "It's your money. Invest in what you want." - Ilana Brown
  • "Understand prohibited transactions to protect your retirement savings. Know who you can invest with and what assets are off-limits." - Ilana Brown
  • "Let syndications do the hard work for you. With the solo 401k, you're in control." - Ilana Brown
  • "Pick the right bank for your solo 401k. Some specialize, making account setup smoother." - Tim Little
  • "Checkbook control simplifies investing in syndications and private lending, optimizing retirement funds." - Tim Little

 

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[00:00:00] Ilana Brown: If you have, alternative assets out there, maybe you're in a deal and the deal doesn't close for another five years. You're like, what do I do? Because if you do hire full-time W 2 employees, No more contributions, and no more rollovers, but you have one year to roll your funds out. And maybe you're in this deal that still has five more years to go. What do you do? You'll want to get a self-directed IRA. So we'll set you up with a self-directed IRA. You'll get any of your investments titled in your LLC name. We'll help you with that process. 

[00:01:04] Tim Little: Good evening, everyone, and welcome to the Journey to Multifamily Millions I'm Tim Little, founder and CEO of ZANA Investments. We help high-net-worth individuals diversify their portfolios and get competitive returns by passively investing in multifamily real estate.  Ilana Brown is with us and she is a solo 401k specialist with solo401k.com, which is part of the neighbors group. They help people get control of their retirement accounts and invest it where they want. I'm excited about this because so many people think they have to settle for letting these big funds manage their retirement money. And be limited to the few options that those funds provide them. I used to think the same thing, but once I discovered this financial tool, it opened up a new world to me, where I could invest my retirement funds in and, in really whatever I wanted, as long as it was within the confines of what was allowed and that, I really want to open that world up to other people as well. I don't want to steal any more of her thunder. So I'm going to shut up for now, Ilana, welcome to the show. And without further ado. Please go ahead and take it away. 

[00:02:05] Ilana Brown: Thanks so much, Tim. And great intro. And what's really cool is that Tim has a solo 401k. So it's so great to do presentations for someone who's actually using their solo 401k and spreading the word. So we absolutely love that. So I'm going to do a short presentation and then after, as Tim said, we'll have plenty of time for some Q and A. all right, so solo 401k and self-directed IRA. It's your money. Invest in what you want. Just like Tim said. So quick disclaimer. So we are not the replacements for your CPAs, your attorneys, or your tax advisors. We are your IRS plan document provider. We provide you with a plan from there. It's fully self-directed, but what's great is we do lots of educational material and we are here to help you with anything that you really need. So as much as we're hands off of your money. We're hands-on for support a little bit about us. So neighbors group started back in 2006. Our founder, Jeff neighbors actually brought the solo 401k to the marketplace. So we've been doing this for a really long time. What's really awesome is that everyone who works at our company has their own solo 401k or self-directed IRA.  So we practice what we preach. The best part of this is the flexibility. You can invest in so many different things. Real estate, cryptocurrency, and all kinds of real estate as well. And we'll jump into that a little bit as well. I really like what Tim does. So Tim does syndications and multifamily investments. What's really nice about that, guys, is Tim is doing all the hard work for you. instead of having to go buy your own property, do all the research, and deal with tenants. You don't have to do that with syndication. So I really like what Tim does here. it's less liability because you're a limited partner on a deal like this. So love it, Tim. So let's jump into the good stuff. So what is a solo 401k? So it's a company retirement plan. All solo 401ks have a company sponsoring them. So the company exists, therefore the owners and the employees can have a plan. The solo 401k in particular. Is designed for small businesses. This also includes sole proprietorships.  So if you're getting any 1099 income. You can have a solo 401k for business structures. You could be an S corp, C corp, sole proprietor, LLC. There's all kinds of options out there. What can you invest in? Of course, real estate and real estate is probably one of the most popular investments within the solo 401k and self-directed IRA, because it's a tangible asset and it protects against inflation. And we all know what's going on right now with inflation. You're not just limited to real estate. You can invest in private equities. Tax liens, tax deeds, REITs, Bitcoin, cryptocurrency, precious metals, private placements, crowdfunding. So there are so many different things and you could have multiple investments going on at a time. You're not limited to just one. What's really important, of course, is you got to qualify. So in order to qualify, you'll need the presence of self-employment, business activity, and then the absence of full-time W2 employees. So if you have a small business, And you need employees. some options here are part-time W two employees. There are some restrictions there and then contract workers. That is totally okay. So if you meet these three criteria. Two necessary items. You're fine. You qualify. Also, real fast, if you're working full time at a job, and you have a 401k plan, and you also have maybe a side business that you're generating your self-employment income, you could have a solo 401k. You can absolutely have two 401ks. for instance, let's say Josh. He works for Apple. He's a big tech guy. But on the side, he also flips houses. That's his small business. So he can still contribute to his 401k with Apple and also have a solo 401k for his house-flipping business. That's totally fine. It's okay. If you're not working full-time in your small business, it's great. If you are, that's awesome. But if you're just part-time, that's okay as well.  It could just be a side business. You qualify. Now what you'll do with our online application. It's really easy. It's going to take five minutes. One question I always like to bring up is when we ask you to name your trust. It's a retirement trust, but what's important is that this will be the name on all of your investments. You'll see some examples that I give you here in a second because I'm going to be talking a lot about trust. It is just a retirement trust because what happens is you give us this name. We go to the IRS and we get an EIN. So we tell the IRS that anything associated with this trust name is a retirement account and gets all the benefits. That's So I always tell people to choose the name you like, this is the name on all of your investments.  So we do all that heavy lifting. We'll get your plan to you in one business day. As soon as you, get your plan, what you'll do is you'll open up a trash checking account, and then you'll fund your checking account. There are only two ways to fund your solo 401k, and that's going to be rollovers. And a lot of people have rollovers out there because maybe you have traditional IRAs, previous 401ks, and they're stuck in the stock market right now. And that's a very scary place to be stuck in. So you can roll those funds into. The solo 401k. And then of course, new contributions. As soon as you fund that bank account, you're ready to invest. And I'll go over the logistics as well, but let's dig a little deeper into the funding of your solo 401k. So I discussed rollovers from any other retirement account. So previous 401k traditional IRAs, 403bs, the only thing that doesn't roll in is a Roth IRA. Okay. Okay. We do offer self-directed Roth IRAs. If you have Roth IRA funds you want to control, but so that's the only retirement account that's not going to roll in. It is an IRS rule. Another important thing when it comes to rollovers, a lot of people ask this question. It's a great question. So I'm just going to bring it up. People will say, I have this property. It's a rental property. I purchased it years ago with my personal funds. Can I move that into the solo 401k? You cannot because it's not a rollover. you purchase that with personal funds. They're not retirement funds. So you can't just move anything into the solo 401k. It would be great. I would put everything in there. I would put my house. I would put my car. I would put my dog. So you can't do that. It's got to come from a qualified retirement account. So now the second way is contributions, the solo 401k has very high contribution limits for 2022. It's 61, 000. If you're under 50, if you're over 50, it's 67, 500 because you get catch up on the employee side. So let's look at the breakdown here. With the solo 401k, you play both roles. You're the employee and you're the employer. Your employee contribution, which actually can be pre-tax or Roth, you decide, because your plan comes with both capabilities. Some people like the pre tax because you're getting a tax deduction. Some people only use Roth because they want it to grow completely tax-free. Some people use both. It could change every year for you. Just know your plan comes with both. So that employee e contribution, could be either pre-tax or Roth. That's 100 percent of your compensation, but it maxes out at 20, 500. And this is also where your catch up falls. Now for the employee or contribution, this is pre-tax only, and it's either 20 or 25 percent of your compensation. Why do I say 20 or 25 percent if you're a sole proprietor or a single-member LLC, it's going to be 20%. If you're an S corp, C corp or partnership, it does jump up to 25%. So these are contributions. How do you invest? So I know I went over it a little bit, but it's always easy to look at some pictures. So you've started a plan with us. We've sent you all the documents. And you've opened up your bank accounts. You can have as many bank accounts as you want. Your spouse could also be on the plan. So maybe you have some bank accounts for your spouse as well. Your bank accounts are always in your trust name. So we went over that. So everything's always in your trust name because that's what we got the EIN for. So if your bank account's in your personal name, how's the IRS going to know that this is a retirement account? So you always want to follow our guide, lean on us for support because we want you to get this correct. So you've opened up your bank account. You funded it. You might just have one bank account, so don't feel like you need multiple. Don't feel like you have to do Roth and or traditional do what's best for you. So you're funding these bank accounts with your new contributions and or rollovers, we help you with your rollovers. You'll be the one reaching out to your custodian, but we have a great rollover generator that our software will generate for you. It's a packet and you'll send that to your releasing custodian and your releasing custodian will actually send you a check in the mail in the name of your trust or wire the funds to your trust checking account. So the rollover is simple, new contributions, you're just going to wire to that trust checking account. And as soon as those funds settle, you're ready to invest. And I know it seems weird. So just a checking account, you're wiring the funds, but remember it's in your trust name with your trust. And that's the beauty of this as well. This is a checkbook control plan. You have control of your bank account. It's funded. It's time to invest. So what you'll do is you'll wire the funds from your trust checking account to your investment. You'll be wiring it most likely to Tim on all the documentation, those subscription documents for Tim, you're using your trust name. You are the trustee. So you have signatory authority. As soon as you wire those funds, you're in the deal. You've done your first investment. Anytime you're getting any distributions, any kind of return on investment from your deal, it goes back into your trust checking account. Everything flows in and out of that trust checking account. You don't want to take it to personally because then that's a distribution. What if I don't qualify for the solo 401k? No problem. We have the checkbook IRA LLC with the checkbook IRA LLC. It's a little different, but the great thing is you can invest in everything that the solo 401k can invest in. What happens is we set you up with a new IRA and we actually help you roll over the funds. With the solo 401k, you're rolling over your own funds and contacting the custodian. But with this, we are helping you roll over your funds into this new IRA that we've created for you. While we're doing that, we're forming a special-purpose LLC. This LLC is not a business. It only serves for your retirement account. You get to choose that name. So just like with the trust name, you'll choose your LLC name. We'll form it. We form it in Wyoming. And we open up an LLC bank account at the same bank where your IRA is. So we've rolled over the funds into your IRA, and then it's automatically put into your LLC. Your LLC banking account, just like the solo 401k, you have full checkbook control. You do not have to ask us permission to invest. Yes. We're helping you with rollovers. Yes. We're opening up these bank accounts for you, but now you're the one who gets to do the fun part you're investing. So you're wiring those funds to that deal and you've done your first investment, the big difference. there are two big differences between the solo 401k and the self-directed IRA. The first thing is contribution limits with an IRA. you're limited to your six or 7, 000. The solo 401k has that incredible 61, 000 limit. So that's one big difference. The second one is something called UDFI. What is it? It's called unrelated debt finance income. And with this, it has to do with leverage. So most likely Tim is getting leverage for his deals. Most syndications syndicate to get leverage, financing some kind of more, some kind of mortgage. So there is a little bit of a tax. So the tax is applied to how much is borrowed. So it's applied to the portion of income in proportion to the amount borrowed, but it shouldn't be something that deters you from a deal. So yes, you might have a little bit of a tax, but it's better than being in something so unstable as the stock market or somewhere where you're not controlling your funds. So you'll want to work with your CPA, to figure out what the taxes will be. But like I said, don't let this deter you from a deal. And remember this only applies When you're getting into an investment that has obtained leverage, don't forget the solo for one cake does not have your DFI. So I always tell people if you can qualify for the solo for one K, do it. But if you absolutely can't you don't want to work you don't care about getting that self-employment income, the self-directed IRA is a great option

for prohibited transactions. It's great that we can invest in what we want to. With that definitely comes more responsibilities. You need to know about prohibited transactions. What is it? They are transactions that are disallowed in the solo 401k and self-directed IRA. Certain transactions between a retirement plan and a disqualified person. Certain assets are prohibited from being purchased. Wine, rugs, collectibles, I always tell people you want to know, maybe write it down a list of your disqualified people, you, your spouse, Linneal ascendants, Linneal descendants. Hey, your mother-in-law is actually okay. So if you like her, go ahead and invest with her. So an example of this is, so we all know Tim, he's doing these, multifamily deals and he also has a solo 401k. So he's the general partner on these investment deals. His solo 401k is actually not allowed to be a limited partner on his deal because he is disqualified from interacting with himself and his business. So that's an example. So Tim is the GP. His solo 401k cannot be the LP. Getting started. No setup fee, no annual fee. We have one simple flat fee and that's 49 a month. For the IRA, the set of fees is a little higher. Cause remember we're doing those rollovers for you. We're opening up those bank accounts for you as well. With the solo 401k, you're opening up your accounts. Of course, we have full support for both plans, but that's why the fee to set up the IRA is 995, and then the annual fee is 325. Annual maintenance covers everything, your LLC filings, and any registered agent filings. We have an excellent support team. So not only do we have great people who'll help you, but we also have really great educational material. We have our knowledge base. We have our Facebook group, which I love. You can connect with like-minded investors and then on our website, not only does our website have so much great information, but you can chat with a specialist. If you want to book an appointment, you can shoot me an email or you can click here. I'll leave this up for a second. You guys can jot it down. And also if you just want to go over your own specific, situation, maybe you're not sure if you qualify. Maybe you don't know whether you should try to qualify for the solo 401k or just go to the self-directed IRA. So I'm always happy to chat. We have our application link if you're ready to start now. I'll keep this up for a second. Okay, we'll open it up for some Q and a's. 

 

[00:16:57] Tim Little: All right, Alana. Hey, I really appreciate that. I thought that was a great presentation. I'm just going to piggyback on a few of the things that you said, because I don't think people appreciate how easy it is. Until you actually do it the only part that you know that I guess provides some caution is if you do get a solo 401k make sure that you take the recommendations when it comes to the bank that you're associating with because Most I and correct me if I'm wrong, but most banks do not understand this at all So there's a few banks that it seems that they specialize in this and they understand it So you're able to open these accounts with less friction, I would say.

[00:17:41] Ilana Brown: Yeah, thanks for bringing that up, Tim. Absolutely. Our recommended banks have been trained and a lot of people do want to go with their own bank. It's just such a headache. So I love that you said that. And then top secret, we are going to have integrated banking soon, Tim. So you'll learn all about it. We will let all of our current clients know what's going to happen, but we will have integrated banking in the next 30 to 60 days. So you don't even have to worry about that. 

[00:18:05] Tim Little: Awesome. and just, so people will have an idea of the kind of things that you can invest in. She obviously gave you some examples, but I personally have used it to, invest in a syndication as an LP. so I'm invested in a Houston, a Class A Houston property right now, because I felt that was the best use of my retirement funds in terms of the returns that I could get, the level of risk associated. I didn't see anything better. And before that, I went full cycle as an LP on another deal. and I also have used it for private lending, which is another more creative way that, you may not think is available. But again, when you have checkbook control, when you can just wire funds. And you're never touching the money, then that is still allowed again, as long as it's not under the prohibited transactions, which is not so hard money lending. just a few examples of things that I've actually used it for. So it's not just anecdotal.

[00:19:05] Ilana Brown: Oh, can you hear me? Yeah. tell me a little bit about how you did your private lending. Did you have a promissory note? tell me a little bit about the process you went through. 

[00:19:11] Tim Little: Yeah. And, Ray's on the line. He'd probably be the best one to speak to it because there were a couple of us who combined to provide that loan. I think it was, I don't know. it was over a hundred thousand dollars. a couple of us, put in on that, I think formed an LLC in order to. Provide the loans to that person. And then again, the funds, you never touched my hands. So when the interest hit, it went back to my bank account.

[00:19:38] Ilana Brown: Best thing with other people really, a great way to go into investments. You, maybe couldn't have done on your own and less of a liability. So that's, yeah, I love that you have used your solo 401k. More than a lot of people do. A lot of people still just do brokerage and maybe a little bit here and there, but they're missing out on a world of investments.

[00:20:00] Duane Winkel: Yeah. Dwayne. Tim's absolutely right. That's exactly what we did. I think the one restriction was we could joint venture, but the folks that were using their self, self-directed or solo 401k couldn't have more than 25%, if I remember correctly, of the partnership and they couldn't be a manager, but you could still be a partner.

[00:20:20] Tim Little: All right, thanks for that clarification. Dwayne, you had a question. 

[00:20:23] Duane Winkel: Yeah, that's my question I know with some of these, more creative ways of doing things. Can you invest on your own? syndication or apartment deal, or does it have to be with somebody else? 

[00:20:33] Ilana Brown: Yeah. Great question. So if you're the GP on the deal, if you've created the deal, then your solo 401 cannot be. So what I always like to tell people, is if you personally, or your business is involved in a deal, your solo 401k cannot be so great question. 

[00:20:49] Duane Winkel: That's great. We'll just invest it with Tim. And then when Tim needs to, he can invest it with us. That's great. We'll share. Thank you.

[00:20:54] Tim Little: All right. Kelly, I saw you pop up first. You had a question? 

[00:20:57] Kelly Iannone: I win. Yeah. so if I have a full-time job, can I move some of my jobs in my, some of my funds from my company 1K into a solo or self-directed? Fabulous. I have to leave the company first. 

[00:21:12] Ilana Brown: Yeah. Okay. So a few things here. So typically you need something called a triggering event. So a triggering event is either you're 59 and a half, which there's no way that you're 59 and a half. So you can't add the other. And then the other triggering event is if you do leave a job, but I always tell people to go ask your HR department and what you'll want to ask them is if they allow for in-service distributions. Transcribed Some will allow it. Some won't. Remember, it is your money. So if you want to fight a little bit, see what the response is, and go at him again. It's possible. I've heard of being of it happening. It's just not likely. But give it a try. Okay, thank you. Of course. The other question. 

[00:21:55] Duane Winkel: Yeah, absolutely. I think one option that I don't think we talked about at all was lending yourself the money and doing whatever you want with it. 

[00:22:03] Tim Little: Yep. Ray read my mind, 

[00:22:04] Ilana Brown: right? You're hired. You're going to be a solo 401k specialist. You and Tim are coming aboard. Yeah. So I'm a client. Oh, are you a client already? fantastic. your stuff. And actually, Josh and I, my colleague, are doing a whole webinar next week about the participant loan. So it really is an excellent feature of the solo 401k. If you want to borrow funds. From your solo 401k do whatever you want with it. You can utilize this loan. So what you can borrow is 50 percent or 50, 000, whichever is less. So let's say you have, 40, 000 in your solo 401k, you can borrow 20. If you have a hundred thousand, you can borrow 50. And what's great is only that 50 needs to be liquid. your other 50 could be in your, in the syndication with Tim. You just need what you're taking as liquid. So it's really easy. We actually help you with the documentation. Email us, and let us know you want to take the loan. We send you your documents. You e-sign them. You don't even have to send us a copy. As soon as you sign them, just go ahead and wire the funds from your trust checking account to you personally. Do whatever you want with those funds. Go to Vegas, buy a new car, go on vacation, do something that you're not allowed to do in your solo 401k like maybe use it towards your own investment, your own business. So you decide. I have a follow-up question on that exact same topic. And 

[00:23:30] Kelly Iannone: if I can jump in 

[00:23:31] Ilana Brown: because that's 

[00:23:31] Kelly Iannone: very similar to what we can do in like court, like our company, 401ks. Do the same rules apply when there are exceptions from a government perspective, for example, during COVID, there was the exception that you could withdraw up to 100, 000, if you were impacted, you could withdraw up to 100, 000 without penalty, you still have to pay taxes. Do those types of exceptions apply to solo 401ks and self-directed as well? 

[00:23:53] Ilana Brown: Yeah, they do for, if the IRS makes a rule about 401k is the solo 401k is a 401k. So all rules apply and which was really cool during COVID when they said that you could take that a hundred thousand out, you're actually allowed to put that back into any retirement account. So a lot of people were pulling that from their company plans and then putting it in their solo 401k. I know, but that's no longer allowed, but. if we go through another crazy time, you just never know what's going on. 

[00:24:21] Kelly Iannone: We did pull 100, 000 out of ours and we used it to buy real estate. We just paid the taxes and well, paying taxes over the three years, but yeah.

[00:24:29] Ilana Brown: And it was a good time to buy also. It was. It was. Good job. I don't 

[00:24:34] Tim Little: regret that. So Ilana, a couple of questions that I had here. So what are some of the biggest mistakes that you see people make with these accounts? 

[00:24:43] Ilana Brown: Yeah. probably like you said, not using one of our recommended banks, not setting up their accounts, So that's probably one of the biggest. prohibited transactions, getting into deals that you're not allowed to do. and people always say to me, Alana, like the IRS is not going to catch me, I'm this little tiny thing in this big pond. And I'm like, they may not, but the consequences are so steep. So I always tell people, they just do not want to mess with the IRS. So that's really important. Something else that's important is having a good CPA to help you. A lot of people ask us lots of task questions and we want to tell you what you can contribute. We really do, but we're not allowed to because, we work so closely with the IRS. So having, someone to help you is really important as well. And then, of course, Leaning on us for support. I've had so many people who set up the wrong brokerage account. And all you have to do is jump in our chat and be like, I'm confused. I don't know what application to do. So using our support team, that is what we're here for. 

[00:25:45] Tim Little: Yeah. The only reason she knows my name is because I asked so many questions. she's probably seen it plenty of times. another question I had, you talked about, and this may get a little wonky, but you talked about UDFI. but we hear more about UBIT. Can you explain the difference between UBIT and UDFI and, how they're associated with these types of accounts? 

[00:26:05] Ilana Brown: Absolutely. And great questions, him. so UDFI is actually considered a UBIT and what UBIT is, it's unrelated business income tax. And this is a big one. And I, and this would be a big mistake that people do as well, but they still do it. If you start to run a business within your solo 401k, you're going to trigger this UBIT tax and it's a really big tax as well. So what does it mean to run a business in your 401k? Maybe you flipping too many properties, so you can flip between maybe two and three properties. a year within your solo 401k, but if you're flipping four or five, or six properties in your 401k, it's now an active business. So you're going to get hit with this big tax. Another big one. Airbnb is a lot of people think that you could have an Airbnb within your 401k. The IRS looks at that as it's a short-term rental. So they almost look at it as if you're operating a hotel and that's an active business. So the big key here is you do not want any active businesses within your 401k franchises. you can't operate a franchise, you're hiring employees. So that's important too. There are different ways around it. There's something called a C corp blocker. I'm not super familiar with that, but you'll want to work with an attorney if you're doing something like that. But yeah, it's really important to be aware of UBIT, and UDFI. UDFI is not a problem in the solo 401k, so that doesn't come up that much. It's only with self-directed IRAs. So I probably see UBIT more as a problem in solo 401ks. People are just trying to flip too many houses and trying to run active businesses within the 401k. 

[00:27:36] Tim Little: Yeah. And then going back to what you were talking about before, where, basically if you're getting a mortgage for the property, then that's going to trigger if you have a self-directed, but I think it's important to know, it seems like to me that it's something that gets overblown. It doesn't mean it's a bad deal just because you're incurring, UBIT or UDFI, the numbers could still make a whole lot of sense. You just have to do the math to make sure that it still makes sense. 

[00:28:04] Ilana Brown: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I always tell people don't let UDFI, deter you from a deal, or running a business in your 401k or IRA that should deter you, but that UDFI, it will probably make sense. It's just, it's just a tax on how much is leverage. So it usually isn't too bad, but of course, crunch your numbers, and do your research. Very important. 

[00:28:25] Tim Little: All right. Any other questions out there? If not, I got one more. let's say that you have a solo 401k, but you get to the point, where you're scaling your business and There's just no way to avoid hiring someone full-time. What happens? Because now at that point, you no longer qualify to be a solo 401k. So can you just talk through what that looks like? Is there a transition process? I'm just curious. 

[00:28:50] Ilana Brown: Yeah, and absolutely. And we have clients probably every month that go through that, which is great. We're so happy if your business is doing great and you need to hire employees. So a few options. If you have, alternative assets out there, maybe you're in a deal and the deal doesn't close for another five years. You're like, what do I do? Because if you do hire full-time W 2 employees, No more contributions, and no more rollovers, but you have one year to roll your funds out. And maybe you're in this deal that still has five more years to go. What do you do? You'll want to get a self-directed IRA. So we'll set you up with a self-directed IRA. You'll get any of your investments titled in your LLC name. We'll help you with that process. So that's one option. Of course, you could liquidate everything and you could roll it into, a bigger 401k plan that you're going to offer for your employees or into an irregular IRA. So you'll have options and we'll always, be happy to go over your options. if you have those alternative assets, you don't have to lose them. That's why we do have this self-directed IRA because everyone qualifies. 

[00:29:53] Tim Little: Okay. No, I appreciate that. Cause I, I don't want there to be like a moment of panic for someone when they're like, Oh my God, I had to hire someone. Now I have to sell everything. all Kelly, you had a question. 

[00:30:02] Kelly Iannone: I have another question. So this all happens when you're not actually drawing distributions from the 401k or IRA, when you're investing, what happens when you get to the point where you're like, okay, I want to start living on this money, or I want to start taking distributions. And you still either have deals that are still out there or can you still invest in deals using the IRA? What does that look like? 

[00:30:25] Ilana Brown: Yeah. Excellent question. You want to start preparing, so you don't have to take out your distributions till I think right now it's 72 or 72 and a half, and that changes every year. So when it is time for your RMD is you do have to make sure you have some kind of liquid, thinking about that, like getting into deals that maybe are going to have, or five. Your terms, you might second guess that if you don't have excess cash, if you have other things that you can sell, then great. But if you're locked up in a lot of items, a lot of investments, you do want to start thinking about that because you will have to pull it when it comes to real estate. let's say you do have like you bought a single-family home, there are ways to distribute pieces of it. So you wouldn't have to sell that whole property. But if you're in a syndication and it's not going to be up for a few years and you have to start taking the funds, then you'll be in a little bit of a pickle.

[00:31:16] Tim Little: All right. Any other questions from the group? All right. if that's the case, then we'll go ahead and give some folks, the rest of their time. Wednesday night back. Ilana, I want to thank you for coming out. I really appreciate you coming on here, giving us this brief and of course, answering all the questions that we had. and then, we don't have a guest locked in for next week. For next month, I'm sorry, but we'll go ahead and get that information out to everyone who's on the mailing list. Ilana, can you, if you want to throw on the screen again or put in the chat, how people can get ahold of you again, that'd be great. And we'll make sure that we include that when we, send the email out as well, of course, so that, folks can contact you.

[00:31:54] Ilana Brown: We'll do. And thank you so much for having me, Tim. And thank you guys who had great questions. I always love it when there are good questions. It makes it more fun for me and more educational for everyone. So I appreciate that. 

[00:32:04] Tim Little: Yep. thank you to everyone for coming out and again, for asking those great questions. it's been awesome and we'll get this out to you as soon as we can. And I look forward to seeing you at the next one. 

[00:32:13] Ilana Brown: Have a great night. 

[00:32:14] Tim Little: Have a great night, everybody. 

[00:32:15] Ilana Brown: And everyone.


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TIM LITTLE (FOUNDER/ CEO)

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