The Pastoral Finance Podcast

Last week the question was how much you need to retire. This week it's the one that comes from the diligent pastor staring at a healthy pre-tax balance: should I do a Roth conversion? He wants a clean yes or no. There isn't one, and for a pastor the honest answer looks different than the advice you'll find everywhere else.
The standard Roth pitch is built for a regular taxpayer. Pay the tax now, let it grow and come out tax free later, no required withdrawals hanging over you. But you're not a regular taxpayer. You have a church 403(b) and a housing allowance, and that allowance doesn't stop the day you retire. Money from a church retirement plan can be designated as housing allowance, and the part you actually spend on housing comes out free of federal income tax. You already own an account that pays you tax free in retirement. So converting those dollars can mean paying tax now, out of pocket, to buy a benefit you already have.
This episode explores:
Why the everyday Roth conversion pitch is written for a regular taxpayer, and where it quietly breaks for clergy
The two questions hiding under "should I convert": which dollars, and when
Which dollars to convert: comparing your projected housing spend against the size of your 403(b), and converting only the excess the housing allowance can never reach
When to convert: the low-income window between the year you step down and the year required withdrawals begin, and why the same conversion can cost a fraction as much in the right year
Why "a conversion shrinks your future RMDs" lands softer for a pastor, since the housing portion of a required withdrawal can still be excluded
The still-working exception, and how in a denominational plan it can follow you from one church to another rather than being tied to the one building
Two avoidable traps: letting the money leave the church plan (a full rollover to an IRA ends the housing allowance on all of it), and triggering higher Medicare premiums through IRMAA with one oversized conversion
The case for converting that gets missed most: protecting a surviving spouse who will file single on a fully taxable account the housing allowance no longer shelters
Additional topics include one simple habit worth building with any money recommendation, asking how the person making it gets paid, and why the clean yes or no you came in wanting is the answer that tends to cost pastors the most.
Before you move a dollar, get a clear picture of where your retirement income will come from and which pieces the housing allowance is already protecting. The Plan Builder at pastoralfinance.com is built for exactly that, and there's a one-page Roth conversion checklist there too, the questions to answer before you convert anything.
About the Host:Todd Hukill serves as an ordained pastor, Finance Director for the Tennessee Ministry Network, and founder of Legacy Path Advisors LLC.
This show provides education and encouragement, not personalized financial or tax advice. Consult a qualified professional familiar with clergy taxation before taking action.

Show notes:
Ask a pastor how much they need to retire and you'll get some version of the same request. They want a number. One clean figure they can write on a sticky note for the bathroom mirror and aim at for the next ten years.
This episode is about why that number, on its own, is the wrong thing to chase. Not because the math doesn't matter, but because there's no single number. There's no single retirement. Two pastors the same age, with the same amount saved, can be in completely different places. One can retire this Sunday. One has a real gap to close. And it has almost nothing to do with the money. It's the life each of them pictured.
This episode explores:
Why a number pulled off the internet (a million dollars, twenty-five times expenses, the four percent rule) hands the same answer to two people living two different lives
The tale of two pastors: same age, same savings, opposite outcomes, and what actually separates them
The better question to ask before you ever open a calculator: what does my retirement actually look like
Why a pastor's real number often lands lower than the standard advice assumes, because some clergy income works differently in retirement
How a round number can lie in both directions, scaring a pastor who's ready and comforting one who isn't
Where to start, and it isn't a spreadsheet. It's your own kitchen table, with the person you're going to spend retirement with
Additional topics include the pastoral image of the shepherd who knows the condition of his flock rather than guessing at it, why most of the fear pastors carry about retirement is really about not knowing, and a simple order of operations: picture the life first, price it second, always in that order.
Mentioned in this episode: Legacy Together, a journal that walks couples through exactly this conversation. The first week is free at LegacyTogetherBook.com. When you're ready to put a number to the life you pictured, the tools at pastoralfinance.com are built for it.
About the Host:Todd Hukill serves as an ordained pastor, Finance Director for the Tennessee Ministry Network, and founder of Legacy Path Advisors LLC.
This show provides education and encouragement, not personalized financial or tax advice. Consult a qualified professional familiar with clergy taxation before taking action.
 

Episode 8 · You're Paying for Ministry Out of Your Own Pocket
Last week the assignment was two numbers: what your church believes it provides you, and what actually gets to your house and stays there. This week Todd closes the gap between them, and the best part is that nobody's pay has to change for it to work.
Meet the pastor with 19,000 miles on an old pickup, a glove box full of receipts, and a habit a lot of ministers share: quietly paying for ministry out of his own household and assuming it evens out at tax time. It doesn't anymore. Since the tax law changed, a W-2 pastor gets nothing back on his income tax for a dollar spent doing ministry, and the housing allowance quietly knocks out part of the expenses he could otherwise claim. The fix isn't a deduction. It's making sure the expense never becomes your income in the first place.
This episode explores:
Why unreimbursed ministry expenses no longer help you at tax time, and why keeping receipts for April stopped working
The Deason rule: how your tax-free housing allowance reduces the ministry expenses you can claim
What an accountable reimbursement plan actually is (bookkeeping, not a benefit), and the four rules that make one work
The salary-reduction trap: why carving reimbursement out of your pay is not an accountable plan
Two well-meaning mistakes that quietly create taxable wages: the flat monthly "expense" check and the December "bless the pastor with the leftover" payout
How to bring a written policy to your board without asking for a raise, and why "I'm not asking for a change in my compensation" does most of the work
This is part two of the pay series that began with Episode 7, "Pastor, How Is Your Pay Determined?" Todd also shares that his new book, Don't Bury It, is coming soon.
About the Host:Todd Hukill serves as an ordained pastor, Finance Director for the Tennessee Ministry Network, and founder of Legacy Path Advisors LLC.
More information, plus a free church budget template with the reimbursement line already in it, at pastoralfinance.com
This show provides education and encouragement, not personalized financial or tax advice. Consult a qualified professional familiar with clergy taxation before taking action.

Episode 7 · Pastor, How Is Your Pay Determined?
You've probably sat in this meeting. The board works down the budget line by line, gets to the pastor's line, and there's a pause. Then somebody says, "What'd we do last year, three percent? Alright, let's do three." Four minutes on the number that sets a family's life for the next twelve months. Nobody's a villain. They just were never handed a method.
A number nobody decided is a number nobody can defend, including you. This episode is about getting the categories straight so you can finally see what you are actually paid, and then getting a method in place so the number is the result of something instead of an accident.
This episode explores:
The three different numbers hiding inside "pastor compensation," and why the board and the pastor are almost never talking about the same one
What actually sits in the package: cash salary, the housing allowance designation (a tax treatment, not a raise), insurance, retirement, and a SECA offset
The biggest quiet distortion in church pay: ministry expenses counted as your compensation, and the accountable reimbursement plan that fixes it without a raise
Why national "average pastor salary" figures never agree, and how to benchmark honestly by church size, region, and role (ChurchSalary.com)
How to ask your board for a method instead of a raise, so the conversation happens on a schedule without you having to bring it up
What 1 Timothy 5 actually says about paying those who lead well, and why it is written to the church, not the pastor
Plus the bivocational pastor's version of this, why a properly designated housing allowance still applies to part-time ministry income, and a one-page assignment: write down what your church believes it provides you, then what actually gets to your house and stays there, and look at the gap.
Todd also shares news of his new book, Don't Bury It, coming soon. Short on purpose, and written for the pastor who has been meaning to get to this for about nine years.
Next week, episode 8 covers how to close that gap with an accountable reimbursement plan, without anyone's pay changing.
About the Host:Todd Hukill serves as an ordained pastor, Finance Director for the Tennessee Ministry Network, and founder of Legacy Path Advisors LLC.
More information, plus a free church budget template, at pastoralfinance.com
This show provides education and encouragement, not personalized financial or tax advice. Consult a qualified professional familiar with clergy taxation before taking action.

Episode 6 · Does a Pastor's Housing Allowance Pass to the Surviving Spouse?
Some questions never get asked out loud in a meeting. They get asked in a hallway, or in an email late at night after everyone else has gone to bed. Here is one of them: when my husband passes, do I keep the housing allowance?
The answer is no. The housing allowance ends with the minister whose ministry created it, and a lot of couples are carrying the wrong answer around right now without knowing it. This episode explains why, and what to do about it while it is still easy to fix.
This episode explores:
Why the housing allowance attaches to the minister's own credential and service, not to the marriage (IRS Revenue Ruling 72-249)
Why an ordained spouse cannot stack her own credentials onto her husband's account to keep his allowance going
The "widow's penalty": how household income drops and the tax bill goes up at the very same moment
Why distributions that once came out free of federal income tax become fully taxable for the survivor
How filing as a single taxpayer after the year of death taxes the same dollars harder
The surviving-spouse version of the account balance that most couples have never been shown
Additional topics include a surviving spouse's beneficiary options, the four steps every ministry couple should take now (from running the survivor number to checking the beneficiary form), the role of term life insurance during the working years, and why planning ahead is an act of love, not a lack of faith.
About the Host:Todd Hukill serves as an ordained pastor, Finance Director for the Tennessee Ministry Network, and founder of Legacy Path Advisors LLC.
More information available at pastoralfinance.com
This show provides education and encouragement, not personalized financial or tax advice. Consult a qualified professional familiar with clergy taxation before taking action.

Episode 5 · The Mortgage Is Gone. The Housing Allowance Isn't.
A pastor called me the week he made his last mortgage payment. He wasn't celebrating. He wanted to know if his housing allowance was about to disappear.
The answer is no. But almost nobody had ever explained the part that actually matters.
In this episode we walk through what really happens to the Section 107 housing allowance when the mortgage goes away. What still counts as a housing expense once the note is paid. How the lesser-of-three test quietly decides everything. Why home improvements count in full the year you pay for them, and why the timing of a big renovation across two tax years can shelter thousands more than doing it all at once.
Then we get to the part most pastors have never been told. The housing allowance doesn't have to end when your paycheck does. A qualifying church plan, a 403(b)(9), can generally designate your retirement distributions as housing allowance. And one routine rollover into an IRA can end that treatment permanently.
Also covered: what does not count, the fair rental value number most pastors have never calculated, what parsonage pastors need to know, and the five steps to take before you move a dollar.
Todd Hukill is an ordained pastor, Finance Director for the Tennessee Ministry Network, and founder of Legacy Path Advisors LLC.
More at pastoralfinance.com
This show is for education and encouragement, not personalized financial or tax advice. Talk with a qualified professional who knows clergy taxes and your situation before you act.

Is it okay for me to do well financially? A lot of pastors are afraid to ask that out loud. A raise comes through, a little margin finally shows up in the savings account, and instead of relief they feel a quiet guilt, like they got away with something they shouldn't have.
In Episode 4 of The Pastoral Finance Podcast, Todd Hukill takes that guilt apart. Nobody handed it to you from Scripture. Ministry culture handed it to you, and it is costing you and maybe your family too.
Scripture doesn't shame provision. It honors it. The famous warning is about the love of money, the root that pulls a heart from God, never about money itself, and never about a worker being paid for his work. Writing to Timothy about elders who lead well, Paul says the worker deserves his wages. Provision for the people who do the work is the design, not a loophole.
In this episode:
Why pastors feel guilt over financial health that no one else in their situation would feel
The line ministry culture keeps smudging: greed is wanting more to have more; provision is having enough to do more
Why a financially healthy pastor is often the most generous person in the room
The hard truth: staying broke is not a spiritual gift, it often just makes you a future burden
Four practical steps: receive what your church already offers, know what your money is for, plan without apologizing, and give on purpose
You can do well and stay humble. The two were never enemies.
More free articles and resources for pastors: https://pastoralfinance.com
Want help seeing the whole picture? Todd offers a Pastor Retirement Checkup through Legacy Path Advisors: https://www.legacypathadvisors.com/pastor-retirement-checkup
Grab the free first chapter of Todd's book: https://www.toddhukill.com/free-chapter (New book releases next week. Get the free chapter now and be first in line.)
If this helped, subscribe, leave a review, and send it to a pastor who needs it.
This show is for education and encouragement, not personalized financial or tax advice. Before you act on anything, talk it through with a qualified professional who knows clergy taxes and your situation.

"The church will take care of me." Most pastors would never say it out loud, but many quietly build their future on it. In Episode 3 of The Pastoral Finance Podcast, Todd Hukill explains why your church, no matter how much it loves you, is not your retirement plan, and why realizing that early is one of the kindest things you can do for your family.
 
A church can love you completely and still not be your retirement plan. One is a relationship. The other is a structure. You need the structure, on purpose, with your name on it.
 
In this episode:
Why "we'll take care of our pastor" is a sentiment, not a funded account
How board turnover and tightening budgets quietly change that promise
Why the parsonage is a gift while you serve but builds no equity that is yours
The 403(b)(9) church plan and the feature that makes it different: distributions a credentialed minister can designate as housing allowance, excluded from federal income tax within the limits, a benefit you lose if you move that money to an ordinary IRA
The one honest question to start with: if ministry income stopped, where would yours come from?
 
This is stewardship, not fear. You can love your church and still build something your family can stand on.
 
Read the full article this episode is based on: https://www.pastoralfinance.com/blog/your-church-isnt-your-retirement-plan
 
More free articles and resources for pastors: https://pastoralfinance.com
 
Want help seeing the whole picture? Todd offers a Pastor Retirement Checkup through Legacy Path Advisors: https://www.legacypathadvisors.com/pastor-retirement-checkup
 
If this helped, subscribe, leave a review, and send it to a pastor who needs it.
 
This show is for education and encouragement, not personalized financial or tax advice. Before you act on anything, talk it through with a qualified professional who knows clergy taxes and your situation.

Many pastors reach their fifties and sixties carrying a quiet fear. They gave their best years to the church, and now they wonder if they will ever be able to retire. If that is you, hear this: it is not too late.
 
In Episode 2 of The Pastoral Finance Podcast, Todd Hukill talks honestly about retirement for pastors. Why so many feel behind, why clergy retirement works differently than most advice assumes, and the steps you can take today no matter where you are starting from.
 
Todd is an ordained pastor and has spent nearly two decades as a financial advisor and as Finance Director for a statewide ministry network. This show gives pastors clear, trustworthy help with the money side of ministry. No pressure, no guilt.
 
In this episode:
Why so many pastors feel like retirement is out of reach
What makes clergy retirement different: the housing allowance in retirement, 403(b)(9) church plans, and the Social Security opt-out decision
Why it is not too late to start, even later in ministry
A simple next step to get clarity on where you stand
 
Free articles and resources for pastors: https://pastoralfinance.com
 
Want a clearer picture of your own retirement? Todd offers a Pastor Retirement Checkup through Legacy Path Advisors: https://www.legacypathadvisors.com/pastor-retirement-checkup
 
If this helped, subscribe, leave a review, and send it to a pastor who needs it.
 
This show is for education and encouragement, not personalized financial or tax advice. Before you act on anything, talk it through with a qualified professional who knows clergy taxes and your situation.

Most pastors were never taught how to handle money. They lead people well, then quietly carry stress about their own finances. In this first episode of The Pastoral Finance Podcast, Todd Hukill walks through five money mistakes he sees pastors make again and again, and a simple next step out of each one.
 
Todd is an ordained pastor and has spent nearly two decades as a financial advisor and as Finance Director for a statewide ministry network. This show exists to give pastors clear, trustworthy help with money. No pressure, no guilt.
 
In this episode:
1. Waiting too long to ask for help
2. Living paycheck to paycheck without knowing where the money goes
3. Trying to manage your money without a system
4. Thinking you are planning just because you have a budget
5. Trying to fix everything at once
 
The takeaway: you are not alone, and you are not stuck. Real progress is a series of small, consistent steps. Pick one and take it this week.
 
Free articles and resources for pastors: https://pastoralfinance.com
 
If this helped, subscribe, leave a review, and send it to another pastor you care about.
 
This show is for education and encouragement, not personalized financial or tax advice. Before you act on anything, talk it through with a qualified professional who knows clergy taxes and your situation.