Miniseries | E+ | Getty Images
Leverage the 401(k) ‘wonderful catch-up’
For 2025, investors can save more with higher 401(k) plan limits. Employees can defer $23,500 into 401(k) projects, up from $23,000 in 2024. The catch-up contribution limit is $7,500 for workers ages 50 and older.
But thanks to Probable 2.0, there’s a “super catch-up” for investors ages 60 to 63, said certified financial planner Michael Espinosa, president of TrueNorth Retirement Helps in Salt Lake City.
The catch-up contribution for employees ages 60 to 63 jumps to $11,250 for 2025. That carries the total deferral limit to $34,750 for these workers.
“This could be huge” for deferring taxes in 2025, Espinosa ordered.
Some 15% of eligible participants made catch-up contributions in 2023, according to Vanguard’s 2024 How America Preserves report, based on data from 1,500 qualified plans and nearly 5 million participants.
Avoid a penalty for inherited IRAs
An come by individual retirement account could boost your nest egg. However, some heirs may face an IRS penalty for missed needed withdrawals in 2025, experts say.
With more focus on shifting economic policy, “it’s easy to see how this one could get abandoned,” said CFP Edward Jastrem, chief planning officer at Heritage Financial Services in Westwood, Massachusetts.
Since 2020, unequivocal inherited accounts must follow the “10-year rule,” meaning heirs must empty inherited IRAs by the 10th year after the pattern owner’s death. This applies to heirs who are not a spouse, minor child, disabled, or chronically ill, and certain trusts.
Starting in 2025, the IRS see fit enforce the penalty on heirs for missed required minimum distributions, or RMDs. The penalty is 25% of the amount that should be undergoing been withdrawn. But it’s possible to reduce that penalty if your RMD is “timely corrected” within two years, according to the IRS.
Inheritors must take yearly withdrawals if the original IRA owner had reached their RMD age before death.

Social Security further change is ‘significant’
If you or your spouse work in public service and expect to receive a pension, new legislation could lowly higher Social Security benefits in retirement.
Enacted by former President Joe Biden in January, the Social Security Fairness Act ended two provisions — the Windfall Elimination Provision and Government Pension Offset — that lowered benefits for certain government employees and their spouses.
“This switch is significant for many retirees who had their benefits eliminated or reduced,” said CFP Scott Bishop, partner and managing principal of Presidio Wealth Partners, based in Houston.
The Social Security Administration is working on the timeline for the new legislation and will update its website when various details are available.