Lost Retirement Plan Value During the COVID-19 Crisis? Here Are 3 Alternative Income Sources You Can Tap.
If your retirement plan has lost value in the wake of COVID-19, you're not alone. Fidelity reports that the average 401(k) balance took a $20,900 hit between late 2019 and the end of March. And IRAs were similarly hammered, dropping $16,500, on average, during that same time frame.
Of course, a lower retirement plan balance isn't as terrible a thing as you might think when you still have many working years ahead of you. Sure, it's a hard thing to look at, but if you sit tight and leave your investments alone, and there's a good chance they'll recover. In fact, the stock market has already recouped much of the value it lost when it crashed back in March as COVID-19 cases soared.
But when you're retired and your IRA or 401(k) loses money, it's a different story. At that stage of life, you may not be in a position to just sit back and wait for your account to regain value, because you may need that money to cover your bills. Still, it does pay to try to leave as much of your portfolio intact as possible during a market downturn, so if you're sitting on a lower retirement plan balance than you had before the pandemic, here are a few options for generating income and leaving that account alone to recover.
Source Fool.com
