Today I want to talk about a concept specific to the placement of your investment accounts. By placement, I mean whether you own your investments inside of a tax-deferred investment account such as an IRA or 401(k), the Self-Directed account types offered by Rocket Dollar, and/or a taxable brokerage account. Placing your retirement dollars in a tax-deferred account allows your earnings to grow tax-free.
Let’s take two individuals on the Rocket Dollar team (just for the fun of it): Ryan, one of our engineers, invests $100,000 earning 7% consistently year over year, for 20 years, versus Tiva, another engineer for Rocket Dollar, who also invests $100,000 and earns 7% consistently over 20 years, too. The difference is Tiva has a tax-deferred account and will actually have a $136,874 increase in value over Ryan, who owns the investment in a taxable brokerage account.
Even if Tiva were to withdraw that money, sure, she’s going to have to pay the taxes somewhere down the road, but it would still only be $90,000 in taxes. Tiva’s earnings, even with taxes, still offer a net of almost $50,000 better than what Ryan earned with the exact same investment in a taxable account.
| 5 years | 10 years | 15 years | 20 years | |
| Ryan | $125,755 | $158,144 | $198,874 | $250,094 |
| Tiva | $140,255 | $197,715 | $275,903 | $386,968 |
This chart makes it easy to understand that investing with a tax-deferred account will always win out over a taxable brokerage account. You can take advantage of the tax savings with a Self-Directed IRA or Solo 401(k), and this way you can also invest in alternatives (real estate, private equity, peer-to-peer loans, etc.) should you choose to.