Robinhood Is Offering an Amazing Rollover IRA Bonus -- but You Have to Act Fast

Employer matching contributions into a 401(k) or similar retirement plan have been around for a long time. But that just wasn't a thing for IRAs -- until Robinhood got into the IRA business.

Robinhood has been actively trying to get away from its reputation as a platform for trading and speculating that gamifies investing, and part of that was introducing retirement accounts on its platform in late 2022. As part of its new IRAs, Robinhood shook up the brokerage industry by announcing that it would be matching 1% of all customer IRA deposits.

Most important for our purposes, this matching program applied to both new contributions to IRAs as well as rollovers and transfers. In other words, if you had $100,000 in a 401(k) from a former employer, rolling it into a Robinhood IRA would result in a $1,000 bonus.

To keep the matching bonus, it must remain in the account for at least five years -- similar to the vesting periods used in 401(k) investing. This also ensured that Robinhood IRAs would be used for their intended purpose of long-term investing.

Robinhood Gold users get three times the bonus

Robinhood Gold subscribers get an even better match. The $5 monthly subscription fee includes several perks, such as access to stock research, a 5% APY on uninvested cash, higher instant deposit limits, and more. For IRA investors, the match is increased from 1% to 3% for new contributions to IRAs. If you contribute the 2024 maximum of $7,000 to an IRA, this perk alone justifies the cost of membership, and then some.

A temporary change that could be worth thousands of dollars

As mentioned in the previous section, the 3% matching rate (which Robinhood calls Retirement Boost) applies to new contributions to IRAs, not to rollovers and transfers. Those generally still get 1%.

But until April 30, Robinhood is extending the 3% bonus rate for Robinhood Gold members to rollovers and transfers as well.

In order to keep a 3% bonus (on new contributions or rollovers), you need to keep the money in the account for at least five years and you need to remain a Robinhood Gold subscriber for at least one year.

Here's why this could be such a big deal. Let's say that you have a $100,000 IRA with another brokerage. If you transfer the account and all the investments in it to a Robinhood IRA, you'll get $3,000 in free money to add to your investments. Or, if you have a $250,000 401(k) from a former employer, your bonus for rolling it into a Robinhood IRA would be $7,500. There is no limit. Even if you have a million-dollar retirement account, Robinhood will give you 3% for moving it over, and for the cost of a $60-per-year subscription.

Plus, it isn't just the bonus now. If you got a $3,000 bonus for moving an IRA, as in the first example, it could grow to more than $20,000 over the next two decades, based on the stock market's historical rate of return. In short, a generous bonus like this can have a significant impact on your financial security in retirement.

Should you move your retirement accounts to Robinhood?

To be sure, not everyone has a six- or seven-figure retirement account, but even with a smaller account, a 3% bonus can be a significant amount of money and is more than the bonuses most brokers have historically given for retirement account transfers.

Having said that, there's a lot more to consider than a nice bonus when deciding the best online broker for your retirement account. And as a relatively feature-light investment platform, Robinhood isn't right for everyone. Maybe you're extremely happy with your current broker, or like your old employer's 401(k) plan and want to keep your money there. But the point is that this is an extremely generous offer for transferring or rolling over retirement assets and could be worth a closer look if you're open to making a change.