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RB Robert Brokamp On Motley Fool Hidden Gems Investing

“Whenever you see a zombie movie, it always starts out with just a couple of zombies… and then all of a sudden you're being chased by a town full of zombies. And that's the way RMDs are. In that first year, if you're 73, you have to take out 3.7 percent of your portfolio. That's no big deal. But once you reach age 80 you have to take out 5 percent, 85, more than 6 percent. And you add that percentage on top of the growth of your portfolio, and the amount you're going to have to take out could be increasing by 40 to 90 percent. Again, paying way more in taxes than you expected.”

Motley Fool Hidden Gems Investing · October 2026

“Whenever you see a zombie movie, it always starts out with just a couple of zombies… and then all of a sudden you're being chased by a town full of zombies. And that's the way RMDs are. In that first year, if you're 73, you have to take out 3.7 percent of your portfolio. That's no big deal. But once you reach age 80 you have to take out 5 percent, 85, more than 6 percent. And you add that percentage on top of the growth of your portfolio, and the amount you're going to have to take out could be increasing by 40 to 90 percent. Again, paying way more in taxes than you expected.” — Robert Brokamp, Motley Fool Hidden Gems Investing

Context

Asked why required minimum distributions got a zombie title in a Halloween episode, Brokamp explains that the required withdrawal percentage climbs with age, so withdrawals that start small can grow into a large tax bill.

Transcript

Motley Fool Hidden Gems Investing Around 30:46 into the episode
Robert Brokamp

…you'll have to pay more for medicare that is scary very scary and people just don't think about it because they're so happy to have this tax deferred growth and they're not thinking of how that not only are they going to pay taxes in the future but they're going to be forced to take that money out

David Gardner

and bring zombies back into it again robert it's not exactly clear what the zombies are or how zombies are playing here

Robert Brokamp

so the way i thought about this is whenever you see a zombie movie it always starts out with just a couple of zombies right just one person and then there's like two or three and then all of a sudden you're being chased by a town full of zombies and that's the way rmds are in that first year if you're 73 it's like you have to take out 3.7 percent of your portfolio that's no big deal but once you reach like age 80 you have to take out five percent 85 six more than six percent and you add that percentage on top of the growth of your portfolio and your actual amount you're going to have to take out could be increasing by 40 to 90 percent again paying way more in taxes than you expected

David Gardner

wow so in real world terms and obviously zombies are real so this is the real world i mean just seeing a single zombie in your zip code wherever you are that's much more cause for concern that you're realizing at that moment am i right

Robert Brokamp

that's absolutely right it's you know there's never just one zombie

David Gardner

there's never just one zombie and so help us get out of these potentially horrendous circumstances robert financially what should we be doing

Speaker names come from our own diarization. The position is estimated from where the line sits in the episode.

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