any advice would be great... i'm 26
1. You keep 100% of the money you put in. Any money that the employer contributed is subject to a vesting schedule. For example if your employer give 20% vesting for each year you worked there, and you left the company after 3 years, you'd get to keep 60% of the money that came from your employer.
2. Any bank or investment broker can set up an IRA for you. They can help you do a direct rollover of money from your 401k to the IRA with no penalties and no taxes (After you leave the company where the 401k is located).
As others have stated, anything YOU contributed to the 401(k) and any 'vested' amount of employer contributions, you own. You can open an IRA at ANY financial institution. I suggest a brokerage firm over a bank. They offer more investment options. Actually, I don't consider ANY account at a bank as an investment. If you contact a financial institution and tell them you wish to open an IRA, they will walk you though the process. If you tell them you wish to roll over a 401(k) from company X, they can probably do that paperwork for you as well.
You do want to roll it over to a self directed IRA.
Select a good broker or mutual fund house. If you have less than 10,000 I strongly recommend a fund company. Most investment firms will be more than happy to help you invest.
Yes -- anything that you contributed plus anything your employer contributed that is vested.
You can get the paperwork from your former employers H/R department for a direct IRA rollover. Then contact a company like Vanguard.com for instructions for setting up the new IRA account and initiating the transfer.
The amounts vested in the 401k plan belong to you.
You can start an IRA at your bank. You can also roll-over the vested amounts from the 401k to your bank IRA.