Changed from job that had a 401K, and the new one doesn't. How do I answer when filing?
If you had a retirement plan at any time in 2013 you are considered covered by an plan. Are You Covered by an Employer's Retirement Plan? You’re covered by an employer retirement plan for a tax year if your   employer (or your spouse’s employer) has a: Defined contribution plan (profit-sharing, 401(k), stock bonus and money purchase pension plan) and any contributions or forfeitures were   allocated to your account for the plan year ending with or within the   tax year; IRA-based plan (SEP, SARSEP or SIMPLE IRA plan) and you had an amount contributed to your IRA for the plan year that ends with or   within the tax year; or Defined benefit plan (pension plan that pays a retirement benefit spelled out in the plan) and you are eligible to participate for the   plan year ending with or within the tax year. Box 13 on the Form W-2 you receive from your employer should contain a   check in the “Retirement plan” box if you are covered. If you are   still not certain, check with your (or your spouse’s) employer. The limits on the amount you can deduct don’t affect the amount you   can contribute. However, you can never deduct more than you actually   contribute. Additional Resources: Publication 590, Individual Retirement Arrangements (IRAs)
Adapted from an answer to a somewhat different question. Generally, 401k plans have larger annual expenses and provide for poorer investment choices than are available to you if you roll over your 401k investments into an IRA. So, unless you have specific reasons for wanting to continue to leave your money in the 401k plan (e.g. you have access to investments that are not available to nonparticipants and you think those investments are where you want your money to be), roll over your 401k assets into an IRA. But I don't think that is the case here.  If you had a Traditional 401k, the assets will roll over into a Traditional IRA; if it was a Roth 401k, into a Roth IRA. If you had started a little earlier, you could have considered considered converting part or all of your Traditional IRA into a Roth IRA (assuming that your 2012 taxable income will be smaller this year because you have quit your job). Of course, this may still hold true in 2013 as well.  As to which custodian to choose for your Rollover IRA, I recommend investing in a low-cost index  mutual fund such as VFINX which tracks the S&P 500 Index. Then, do not look at how that fund is doing for the next thirty years.  This will save you from the common error made by many investors when they pull out at the first downturn and thus end up buying high and selling low. Also, do not chase after exchange-traded mutual funds or ETFs (as many will likely recommend) until you have acquired more savvy or interest in investing than you are currently exhibiting. Not knowing which company stock you have, it is hard to make a recommendation about selling or holding on. But since you are glad to have quit your job, you might want to consider making a clean break and selling the shares that you own in your ex-employer's company. Keep the $35K (less the $12K that you will use to pay off the student loan) as your emergency fund. Pay off your student loan right away since you have the cash to do it. "&gt;I hear lots of interesting stories about teaching. The most recent involves an experimental program where the teacher performance isn't graded on student outcomes but how well they're following the narrative defined by the program. Every few years teachers are handed new programs that the district curriculum people bought and told ""you're going to teach $subject using this program now!"" (sometimes those programs work better for different groups of students - the ones that it was evaluated with do great, the ones in different neighborhoods are failed by the program) The programs are implemented district wide and the teachers are told not to deviate from the programs.  Nothing really ""new"" there at all. And it isn't ""local control"" -- it is the opposite: standard ""central planning"", typically driven by Federal and State ""Department of Education"" bureaucrats in combination with Teacher's Union officials (but I am being redundant, because they are one and the same, there being a revolving door). And then it is pressed down on the school by an administrator who is attempting to please the ""higher ups"" (and/or to guarantee the flow of funds linked to said program) on one of their several ridiculously inane ""metrics"".  &gt;A recent example from the town I grew up in.  That letter is *hilariously SAD* (and not for the reasons that you think).  This ""teacher"" (with a Masters Degree (!!!!) in Reading -- from which I assume they believe they understand ""reading"" better than anyone  -- be interesting to know the last time this ""Master"" of reading actually READ a book that wasn't strictly required, the answer is probably a decade or more ago)...  This ""teacher"" is really just one central-planning disciple who is objecting to a *different* central planning program than the one they themselves were indoctrinated into.  The whole thing is very revealing regarding the sheer lunacy of the ""scientific educator"" and ""scientific education"" paradigm.  This teacher (like the administrators the teacher derides) is concerned about the WRONG things. There is really no concern about whether kids are learning how to read and to enjoy/utilize reading (which is a rudimentary skill kids can pick up on their own, provided they haven't had it turned into ""torture"" by some brainless curricula &amp; teacher).  But rather it is all about ""what [curricula] to use for reading/language arts"".  The phrasing of that question and the misguided emphasis of it reveals the fact that the teacher really doesn't have a CLUE how to truly get kids reading and understanding the English language.  Basically he/she just wants to ""work a program"" (by a semi-mindless *rote*) and is really only pissed because the programs keep being changed on them.   *Fortunately, a least a small part of the kids WILL learn to read (mostly due to authors/industry putting out things they are interested in -- all hail JK Rowling, JRR Tolkien, &amp; Suzanne Collins) not because of but* **despite** *the formal schooling systems attempts to ""teach"" them.*" Why would you want to withdraw only the company match, and presumably leave your personal contributions sitting in your ex-company's 401k plan? Generally, 401k plans have larger annual expenses and provide for poorer investment choices than are available to you if you roll over your 401k investments into an IRA. So, unless you have specific reasons for wanting to continue to leave your money in the 401k plan (e.g. you have access to investments that are not available to nonparticipants and you think those investments are where you want your money to be), roll over part (or all) of your 401k assets into an IRA, and withdraw the rest for personal expenses.  If your personal contributions are in a Roth 401k, roll them over to a Roth IRA, but, as I remember it, company contributions are not part of the Roth 401k and must be rolled over into a Traditional IRA. Perhaps this is why you want to take those in cash to pay for your personal purchase? Also, what is this 30% hit you are talking about? You will owe income tax on the money withdrawn from the 401k (and custodians traditionally withhold 20% and send it to the IRS on your behalf) plus penalty for early withdrawal (which the custodian may also withhold if you ask them), but the tax that you will pay on the money withdrawn will depend on your tax bracket, which may be lower if you are laid off and do not immediately take on a new job. That is, the 30% hit may be on the cash flow, but you may get some of it back as a refund when you file your income tax return. "It would take an unusual situation.   They exercise certain types of option, which come in as regular income rather than capital gains, and are holding the stock ""long"" (perhaps they are not allowed to sell because of an insider-trading freeze window; like right before earnings announcements).  And then the stock tanks.  Their company is acquired.   They get stock options in their unicorn at $1/share, which blows up to $1000/share right as HugeFirm buys it. Options are swapped dollar-for-dollar for HugeFirm stock (at $250/share) so 4 shares for 1.   I heard this happened a lot in the 1999-2000 boom/bust.   And the problem was, this type of stock-option had historically only been offered to $20-million salary CEOs and CFO's, who retained professional legal and financial counsel and knew how to deal with the pitfalls and traps of this type of option.  During the dot-com boom, it was also offered to rank-and-file $50k salary tech employees who didn't even know the difference between a 401K and a Roth.   And it exploded in their faces, making a big mess for everyone including the IRS -- now struggling to justify to Congressmen why they were collecting $400,000 in taxes on entirely phantom, never-realized income from a 24 year old tech guy earning $29k at a startup and eating ramen.  When that poor guy never had a chance of understanding the financial rocks and shoals, and even if he did, couldn't have done anything about it (since he wasn't a high executive involved in the decisions).  And even the company who gave him the package didn't intend to inflict this on him.  It was a mistake.  Even the IRS dislikes no-win situations.   Some laws got changed, some practices got changed, etc. etc., and the problem isn't what it used to be." "Your employer should send you a statement with this information. If they didn't, you should still be able to find it through E*Trade. Navigate to: Trading & Portfolios>Portfolios. Select the stock plan account. Under ""Restricted Stock"", you should see a list of your grants. If you click on the grant in question, you should see a breakdown of how many shares were vested and released by date. It will also tell you the cost basis per share and the amount of taxes withheld. You calculate your cost basis by multiplying the number of released shares by the cost basis per share. You can ignore the ordinary income tax and taxes withheld since they will already have been included on your W2 earnings and withholdings. Really all you need to do is report the capital gain or loss from the cost basis (which if you sold right away will be rather small)." "You should call your plan administrator and ask. Few plans allow people to take a ""hardship withdraw"" after leaving because their is no way to pay the funds back since you are no longer working there. The repayment process is done via payroll deduction usually. Also you will most likely be required to withhold 20% for taxes from the 401k. There is no way to defer the taxation unless you take it  next calendar year. You may want to consider doing a rollover into an IRA and taking the w/d and you can do a 60 day rollover. You only get 1 per rolling 12 months now (rather than account do to a change in the rule.) IRA's (not 401k) do give you flexible withholding so you don't have to pay taxes today though they would still be in the tax year based on the calendar date taken out, so if you take it out in 2015 your going to be paying them at the end of this year when you file in April of 2016. Your question seems to be mixing characteristics of both 401k and IRA and while they are similar they do operate very differently." "The biggest reason why one might want to leave 401k money invested in an ex-employer's plan is that the plan offers some superior investment opportunities that are not available elsewhere, e.g. some mutual funds that are not open to individual investors such as S&P index funds for institutional investors (these have expense ratios even smaller than the already low expense ratios of good S&P index funds) or ""hot"" funds that are (usually temporarily) closed to new investors, etc. The biggest reason to roll over 401k money from an ex-employer's plan to the 401k plan of a new employer is essentially the same: the new employer's plan offers superior investment opportunities that are not available elsewhere. Of course, the new employer's  401k plan must accept such roll overs. I do not believe that it is a requirement that a 401k plan must accept rollovers, but rather an option that a plan can be set up to allow  for or not.  Another reason to roll over 401k money from one plan to another  (rather than into an IRA) is to keep it safe from creditors. If you are  sued and found liable for damages in a court proceeding, the plaintiff can come after IRA assets but not after 401k money.  Also, you can take a loan from the 401k money (subject to various rules about how much can be borrowed, payment requirements etc) which you cannot from an IRA. That being said, the benefits of keeping 401k money as 401k money must be weighed against the usually higher administrative costs and usually poorer and more limited choices of investment opportunities  available in most 401k plans as Muro has said already." By definition, this is a payroll deduction. There's no mechanism for you to tell the 401(k) administrator that a Jan-15 deposit is to be credited for 2016 instead of 2017. (As is common for IRAs where you do have the 'until tax time' option) If you are paid weekly, semi-monthly, or monthly, 12/31 is a Saturday this year and should leave no ambiguity about the date of your last check.  The only unknown for me if if one is paid bi-weekly, and has a check covering 12/25 - 1/7. Payroll/HR will need to answer whether that check is considered all in 2016, all in 2017 or split between the two.