A Gold IRA often comes with higher fees than a traditional IRA or Roth IRA, which invests exclusively in stocks, bonds, and mutual funds. Proponents of gold IRAs argue that these costs are worth the peace of mind of being protected from a potential financial apocalypse. But let’s assume that a disaster really does happen. How would you redeem your gold if it was in a depot across the country?
Gold IRAs are a special type of self-directed IRA that allows you to invest in physical gold and other precious metals, such as silver, platinum, and palladium. Investing in a Gold IRA requires the services of a custodian bank, a broker to buy gold, and an approved custodian to store gold. Like other self-directed IRAs, gold IRAs can be traditional or Roth. A Gold IRA is a specialized, self-directed individual retirement account designed to store precious metals.
We’ve researched 18 legitimate companies that offer Gold IRA services and reviewed them for the highest consumer ratings from the Business Consumer Alliance (BCA). The two major drawbacks of Augusta are the limited selection of metals and the high minimum investment requirements to set up a Gold IRA. You must store the gold in a Gold IRA in an IRS-approved custody account. You can’t keep it in a locker, a safe at home, or under your mattress. So if you want to hold gold in your IRA, you’ll need to set up a self-directed IRA first and then find a custodian that specializes in self-directed gold IRAs.
A high-quality IRA Gold company only works with carefully vetted, reputable third-party storage companies or secured repositories. To help customers avoid this threat, some IRA companies, for example, are buying back their gold at the wholesale price that was in effect at the time. Those who prefer to invest in stocks of gold companies (such as Barrick Gold), in investment funds of such companies (such as Fidelity Select Gold Portfolio), or in ETFs that track the performance of a gold index (such as SPDR Gold Shares), can do so with a mainstream IRA. Younger investors who have less money to invest in gold could be better off with a traditional IRA and invest in gold equivalents such as gold ETFs or gold mining stocks until they’ve accumulated enough to meet the higher minimum requirements of gold IRAs.
Advantage Gold has made a name for itself as the best Gold IRA company for first-time buyers with its low minimum investment requirements, convenient customer support, and comprehensive educational platform. While most IRA investors invest in more traditional assets such as stocks, bonds, and funds, tax legislation allows investments in precious metals such as gold and silver via specialized IRA accounts. No other Gold IRA company goes to such great lengths to present investment information in an organized and objective way to earn the full trust of its clients.