Selling stock

Just to be clear, you want to sell $50,000 from your personal stock account, right? Not your 401K.

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Do they just write me a check for 50k,

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Yes, but you have to request your broker to send you the check. It doesn't happen automatically.

If you sell a stock the proceeds go into whatever "cash" account (usually a liquid short-term bond money market fund) you selected when you opened the brokerage account. It will stay in 'cash' until you request a withdrawal such as a check paid out to you.

However, my broker (Schwab) allows me to link my bank account to my brokerage account so that I can request a direct deposit without having to wait for a check to come in the mail. The credit appears the next business day in my bank account.

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I pay taxes on that 50k? So I would owe about 20k at the end of the year?

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You subtract your cost basis from the $50k and pay taxes on the gain, not on the full amount of the stock sale proceeds. If you bought the stock for $20k, for example, your gain would be $30k ($50k - $20k) and you would pay taxes on that gain.

If you held the stock for one year or longer, you'd pay a long-term capital gains tax on it (15% for most taxpayers) and not regular income tax at your regular marginal rate.