There are several problems with treating an IRA as a savings account.
First, it takes money straight away from your retirement.
If you and your spouse both qualify for a pension once you retire, then you are at an advantage. However if only one of you qualifies, you must have a backup plan in case one of you passes on and there is no pension for the other.
You should also have a plan in case you split for some reason? What happens then?
The IRA money will be your key to survival.
Second, you’re going to get hit with a big tax burden if you start withdrawing IRA money prior to retirement. It will be treated as regular income that year, which means that you’ll have to pay income taxes on it, plus you’ll also have to pay an early withdrawal penalty on top of that. Remember that this income will be on top of your normal income, so you’ll be likely handing 40-50% of it right to the federal and state governments.
It’s almost never worth it to withdraw an IRA early. You lose a large chunk of the value of it right off the bat while also increasing your retirement risk.
