With a precious metal IRA, you have the option to invest in gold, silver, platinum, other precious metals, and foreign currencies to secure your retirement. Most employers offer retirement accounts to their employees. An individual retirement account (IRA) is one of the most popular options. These accounts allow owners to invest in bonds, stocks, and mutual funds.
However, a self-directed IRA (SDIRA) offers much more. An SDIRA allows owners to invest in just about anything, including real estate, precious metals, private companies, and even foreign exchange. Real estate may be one of the biggest draws, but the opportunity to invest in foreign currencies is not without its own benefits. A Roth Gold IRA is a type of self-directed IRA that allows you to invest in various tangible assets such as art, antiques, collectibles, and even real estate.
Gold and other precious metals are just one of the many things you can buy with a Roth Gold IRA. Self-directed IRAs, of which gold IRAs are one type, have the same contribution and distribution limits, which depend on your age, as traditional IRAs. One important rule to know about storing physical gold in an IRA is that your precious metals MUST be stored at an approved depository institution such as the Delaware Depository Service Company or Brink’s Global Services, not in your home or in a safe. You don’t want to fund a gold IRA with cash because you’ve already paid taxes on that money, and the point of using an IRA as an investment tool is to take advantage of the tax advantage that comes with using pre-tax dollars.
To avoid running afoul of tax rules for proprietary transactions, self-governing IRAs, including gold IRAs, must have an IRS-approved custodian bank. Many Gold IRA companies have preferred custodian banks that they either recommend or require their customers to use, or you can search for a custodian on the RITA website. If you’re considering a Roth Gold IRA as part of your retirement plan, you should look around for your IRA company. With a Roth IRA for gold and silver, your contributions are after tax, which means you pay tax on the money before you deposit it into your IRA account.
Or, if you have a traditional retirement savings account and want to increase your exposure to gold, read here how you can buy a gold ETF, an exchange-traded fund that tracks the performance of gold. In practical terms, this means that the minimum account accounts with many gold IRA companies would require to invest much more than the 5% or less that financial advisors generally recommend investing in precious metals, which could put your nest egg at too high risk. Orion Metal Exchange is a California-based company that offers gold IRAs and a wide variety of precious metals, coins, and gold bars. Most IRA companies may buy back gold, but be aware that the price at which they buy gold is lower than the price at which they sell gold.
If you just want to buy gold or silver, here’s what you need to know about buying gold outside of an IRA. For more information on what to look for when choosing a Gold IRA company, check out Money’s Guide to the Best Gold IRA Companies. In addition to the after-tax rule, Roth’s Gold IRAs include a few other guidelines that you must also follow.
