What is a 401(k) Rollover?

Video Transcript

 According to a survey conducted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, that followed the working careers of Baby Boomers, they found that these individuals held an average of 12 jobs from the age of 18 to 54.
 
What we're seeing is that every generation that has followed the Baby Boomers has spent a lot less time at each job and so while Baby Boomers spent around eight years per job, Gen X is spending on average around five years. Millennials are just at around three years and Gen Z are bringing up the end of this list with just over two years per job. But again, they're young, job hopping is very normal when you're young, so we don't really worry about that.
 
What all of this data means, what it's telling us, is that the chances are extremely high that you've changed jobs multiple times in your career and that you've left an old retirement account behind.
 
What should you be doing or what could you be doing with these old retirement accounts?
 
You might want to try a rollover, a rollover is a process of taking funds from 401ks, 403bs and 457s, all those old accounts, anything you opened while you're working with a former employer and combining them into one new account.
 
This could be the 401k with your current employer or it could be in a new IRA which is an individual retirement account. Either way, whatever option you choose, a rollover allows you to keep track of all your retirement savings in one spot. Because when you're ready to retire, are you really going to remember where that old 401k is that you opened when you were 22?
 
Probably not, but a rollover can really be a great tool to make sure that you keep access to all of the investments that you've worked extremely hard to save.