Rating: 
Summary: Retirement Distribution Planning in Plain English
Review: Ed Slott, one of America's top IRA experts, has the rare ability to translate technical tax jargon into plain English. A practical, humorous primer on a subject vital to every taxpayer's financial health.Highly recommended! Joel P. Bruckenstein
Co-author of Virtual Office Tools for a High Margin Practice
Rating: 
Summary: A Discombobulated Book
Review: Get the NOLO Press book IRAs, 401(K)s & Other Retirement Plans if you want a clear, concise, and above all logically presented and written guide to retirement plans. Slott's book is the antichrist of retirement books. I slugged thru this book 3 times before I essentially gave up and found the NOLO book.
Rating:
Summary: Fire you advisor
Review: I am in the financial services industry. If your current advisor does not understand the IRA, 401K, etc. rules, you need to find one that does. Recently I did an informal survey of my coworkers. I tested their knowledge of retirement plan. Almost all of them failed! If it scares me, and it should frighten all of their clients. If you want to give away a lot of your hard earned money to the government, do not read this book. Otherwise, read the book and find a competent advisor to help you implement the strategies.
Rating:
Summary: Fire you advisor
Review: I am in the financial services industry. If your current advisor does not understand the IRA, 401K, etc. rules, you need to find one that does. Recently I did an informal survey of my coworkers. I tested their knowledge of retirement plan. Almost all of them failed! If it scares me, and it should frighten all of their clients. If you want to give away a lot of your hard earned money to the government, do not read this book. Otherwise, read the book and find a competent advisor to help you implement the strategies.
Rating: 
Summary: Not bad, even with the overly chatty style
Review: I'm an historian and archivist with a "humanities mind," whereas my wife is a mathematician with a knack for anything financial. Our arrangement has long been that she keeps track of our investments (also those of her parents and most of her siblings), works out what to do about them, and then explains it all to me (and them). But she still insists that I make an attempt to understand what's going on, and to that end she hands me books like this one. I have to say that, except for a sense of humor that tries too hard, Slott is better at providing a clear explanation of tax law and financial decision-making than many similar books I've waded through. His specialty is IRAs and similar retirement arrangements, and since I've just turned sixty, I'm paying attention to this stuff. After an introductory section explaining the jargon and describing the theory behind traditional and Roth IRAs, he launches into the details of his "Five Easy Steps": Timing (when and how much to take out of your IRA, including both the legal requirements and your own strategic needs), life insurance (to cover the taxes your beneficiaries will have to pay when they inherit your IRA), stretching the payout period (selecting a child as a beneficiary can keep the distributions going for decades after you're gone, allowing your bequest to keep growing), converting to a Roth IRA if possible (a great tax deal, especially for the beneficiaries), and avoiding estate taxes. Although he calls it "death taxes," a partisan pejorative term I despise; there's far too much concentration of wealth in this country already. He also waxes on about the unfairness of the IRS and the tax code, forgetting the basic principal: Taxes aren't intended to be "fair," they're intended to raise money for the government. Anyway, he does a good job of explaining the options the retiree faces at each step and in each new or variant situation, and he does it with resorting (much) to unexplained bizspeak, which certainly increases its accessibility for most of us. I'm told the regulars on Morningstar's Vanguard discussion board -- a group which has included John Bogle, Larry Swedroe, Rick Ferri, and other Big Names -- think highly of Slott's take on things, and you probably can't do badly if you follow their advice.
Rating:
Summary: A "Must Read" for anyone who has an IRA!
Review: If you are an investor and have money in an IRA or your company retirement plan, Ed Slott's book should be required reading. Ed gives practical, easy to understand, and priceless advice on how to maximize the value of your retirement savings and minimize the bite Uncle Sam will eventually take from it. Once you read this book, you'll know more than 90% of financial advisors.
Rating:
Summary: No one knows IRAs like Ed Slott
Review: No one on the planet knows IRAs better than Ed Slott. Congress has made the rules so complicated, that IRA owner ARE sitting on a Time Bomb -- a tax bomb. Without the proper tax planning, your heirs could stand to lose 70% due to the combined income and estate taxes. If you are fortunate enough that the annual minimum required IRA distributions are not your only source of income, hence you are leaving a bulk of the account intact each year for future growth, you could be doing a disservice to your children or grandchildren. Read Ed Slot's book. Even your favorite charity could receive less than you expected. Read Ed Slott's book. And by the way, whether your hard earned retirement savings is in an IRA, 401K or other similar deferred account, you should be reading Ed Slott's book. I am a practicing CPA and I have read Ed Slott's book.
Rating:
Summary: No one knows IRAs like Ed Slott
Review: No one on the planet knows IRAs better than Ed Slott. Congress has made the rules so complicated, that IRA owner ARE sitting on a Time Bomb -- a tax bomb. Without the proper tax planning, your heirs could stand to lose 70% due to the combined income and estate taxes. If you are fortunate enough that the annual minimum required IRA distributions are not your only source of income, hence you are leaving a bulk of the account intact each year for future growth, you could be doing a disservice to your children or grandchildren. Read Ed Slot's book. Even your favorite charity could receive less than you expected. Read Ed Slott's book. And by the way, whether your hard earned retirement savings is in an IRA, 401K or other similar deferred account, you should be reading Ed Slott's book. I am a practicing CPA and I have read Ed Slott's book.
Rating:
Summary: Much Good Advice
Review: This book is a great resource for those who need this information. But much of it is concerned with "misconceptions" that border on attempts at fraud and showing that you just can't get away with it. The main theme of the book although the author does not point this out is KISS. Keep It Simple Stupid. That way you can understand it. Also the sections on minimum distributions are useful. I will leave it up to the individual, as it should be, to determine the usefulness of insuring the estate tax portion of a retirement plan. All in all a rather useful tome but I am not sure it required all that so to speak. As others have pointed out the "humor" in the book is distracting and does not add much. Ed Slott makes the error of writing pretty much exactly like he speaks at his seminars and it can grind at times. Great for seminars, not so good for books. Worth having on the ole bookshelf.
Rating:
Summary: EXCELLENT BOOK - ABSOLUTE MUST READ
Review: This book is an absolute must for anyone who has an IRA. Not only is it very understandable but it actually saved me thousands upon thousands of dollars. Ed Slott mentioned a deduction that many accountants miss re: IRA beneficiaries ( page 246). In a nutshell, it explained that if a beneficiary IRA was taxed as part of the estate you are entitled to a deduction on your tax return every year for the beneficiary IRA since you cant be taxed twice. Sure enough my acccountant (who is excellent) had missed this deduction which turned out the be worth thousands of dollars over a lifetime for each of four children. This book is worth its weight in gold. I cant recommend it too highly.
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