As a retiree, or someone fast approaching retirement, mandatory plan withdrawals can be a source of stress – and complicated changes over the last few years have led to increased confusion among savers.

Americans must start taking these yearly withdrawals – known as required minimum distributions (RMDs) – by a specific age, or face a penalty.

Before 2020, Americans had to begin withdrawing funds by the age of 70½ – before the Secure Act of 2019 increased the age to 72. Then in December 2022, Congress passed the Secure 2.0 Act, which came into force this year, and raised the age yet again to 73.

‘RMDs are already an obscure factor in traditional retirement that people are under-informed on,’ investment advisor Patrick Donnelly told DailyMail.com.

‘In addition to that, now adding on a layer of complexity of the RMD age changing incrementally over a short period of time, has left people confused about their personal RMD obligations.’

[Shoot, I wasn’t even aware you HAD to withdraw anything if you didn’t need it, less mind a specific amount by a certain age. Guess we need to start reading up on things. ~ Beege]