Retirement Planning Education, with Andy Panko

#152 - Q&A edition...how to deal with market declines, Social Security spousal benefits, vacation home sale impacts on IRMAA and MORE!

Listener Q&A where Andy talks about: 

  • Why more fund managers don't offer mutual fund-to-ETF conversions ( 5:02 )
  • How my firm helps clients prepare for severe market declines, and how we communicate bad markets to them ( 8:48 )
  • Who's the voice of the intro and outro to this podcast ( 16:06 )
  • For spouses claiming Social Security, what's a good claiming strategy when one spouse doesn't have enough work history to get their own benefit and can only get spousal benefits ( 17:19 )
  • Could a person continue to fund a 529 for their children and later transfer the beneficiary to eventual grandchildren ( 21:37 )
  • What constitutes a gift of digital assets; is it the transfer of the key to the wallet? ( 24:01 )
  • What date/time is used for the date of death valuation of assets, like crypto, that trade 24/7 ( 25:52 )
  • How will the sale of a vacation property impact IRMAA ( 26:55 )
  • How will the sale of a vacation property impact Roth conversion analysis and trying to fill up a certain tax bracket ( 28:46 )
  • Why were the recent 3 and 5-year returns of total bond market funds so poor ( 32:48 )
  • Making estimated payments or withholdings to cover the tax obligations from a Roth conversion done late in the year ( 41:39 )
  • Thoughts on a listener's proposed basic retirement plan, investment allocation and bucketing strategy ( 47:20 )


  • The Smart Money, Fresh Minds podcast - here
  • My YouTube video on Estimated Taxes, Tax Withholdings and Underpayment Penalties - here


To send Andy questions to be addressed on future Q&A episodes, email andy@andypanko.com


People on this episode