Are you concerned with inflation?
What about the global recession happening before our eyes?
Is your future retirement secured?
I’ve started looking into precious metals ira companies as a way to have secured retirement.
After spending decades toiling away and building my career, I accumulated a hefty nest egg – and it would absolutely “suck” if I were to lose it all due to our current economic climate.
From 401ks to IRAs and beyond, my financial future was looking bright until the winds of change brought uncertainty with them.
Fortunately, this investment can secure your assets and keep them retain their value until your retirement. Read more to find out what to look out for when searching for the best precious metals ira companies.
Best Gold IRA Companies at a Glance
- Augusta Precious Metals: Editor’s Choice – Great Gold IRA Fees
- Goldco: Runner up – Great Reputation
- American Hartford Gold: Best Gold IRA Company with Great Buyback Program
- Birch Gold: Excellent Customer Service
#1 Augusta Precious Metals: Editor’s Choice – Great Gold IRA Fees
If there is one thing Augusta Precious Metals boasts, it’s their excellent customer service. In these kinds of companies, client transparency is essential. It would help if you listened to their needs and concerns to deliver the best services.
In some cases, the company is even known as the guardian of the precious metals market. Their reputation in the industry is top-notch, and people constantly go to them when looking for a company they can trust with their savings.
They make diversifying your retirement portfolio possible and much more efficient. You can give them your confidence that they will take care of your money for you and even allow it to grow over time.
Additionally, Augusta Precious Metals also provides educational materials and programs to their clients to learn more about how the precious metals investment industry works and how much it can benefit them.
You need to know that precious metals will always have value worldwide. Due to economic concerns and political crises, you can always rely on precious metals for whatever happens to the stock market.
Augusta Precious Metals have thousands of positive reviews from verified clients across platforms. If you want to start investing in precious metals today, you can always reach out to them on their site.
Pros
- Great Prices on Gold and silver
- Zero complaints with high customer satisfaction
- The site contains educational videos and materials
- Supports diversified investment
- Physical options are available
Cons
- Steep minimum investment cost
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#2 Goldco: Runner up – Great Reputation
Goldco is often the most recommended precious metal IRA company for a reason. They are a trusted organization in the industry and rarely receives any complaints from its clients regarding the products and services,
They were able to rise to the top of many lists for genuine care for their clients. They have served many people and provided them with an IRA, 401(k), 403(b), savings, and other tax-efficient accounts for their retirement. The only one who can hold physical gold is the precious metal IRA.
This is where the expertise of Goldco lies. They offer several varieties of gold, silver, platinum, and palladium that meet the IRS’s purity standard. They hedge against inflation and other economic and political crises that may arise in the world.
Goldco can help you set up an account with less asset volatility. Getting more exposure to the stability of gold and various precious metals in your retirement portfolio will be helpful to keep your wealth safe and protected for the longest time.
The company will provide experts and custodians to guide you at every step, even with the rollover of your funds from other IRAs. They will also ensure that your actions are always within the IRS guidelines, so you will not be subject to tax penalties.
Pros
- Wide range of articles to read
- A+ rating from many customers on BBB, trustpilot
- Great buyback program
- Provides guide and start-up kits
- Endorsements from prominent public figures
Cons
- Need to meet their minimum requirement to invest into precious metals
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#3 American Hartford Gold: Best Gold IRA Company with Great Buyback Program
American Hartford Gold is a reputable gold IRA company that offers competitive investment plans. During times of uncertainty, it is best to have a backup plan to ensure that they will not put your hard-earned money to waste.
For the longest time, the company has served many families and provided them with financial security during their retirement. They know how to take advantage of market movements and what it is for their clients to experience the benefits of precious metal investment.
American Hartford Gold offers a customized solution for your unique needs. You can choose how you want your IRA to look and what kind of assets you want to keep. They have many options of physical gold and silver products approved by the IRS to incorporate into your retirement account.
The company believes that education is an essential factor in fostering financial success. All of their clients are given access to live precious metals charts, Data Centers, and account representatives to inform them regarding their assets.
They also have a customer service team ready to attend to your inquiries while acquiring gold and silver assets from the company. If you choose to work with them, your precious metals will be stored in secured and reliable depositories in the country until you are ready to take distributions.
Pros
- The majority of the questions and complaints are solved
- No minimum costs
- Gold and Silver IRAs are available
- Excellent customer ratings
Cons
- Limited bullion option
- No listed custodian fees
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#4 Birch Gold: Excellent Customer Service
Birch Gold Group has been in the industry for more than twenty years. If you value experience and expertise, you will indeed be surprised by what this precious metal IRA company can offer you.
They know all the ups and downs of the market and can ultimately help you curate the best retirement account to ensure a better future for your finances.
One of their main goals is to teach their clients the alternative assets in investing and what resources they need to create a better and more diverse retirement portfolio.
They understand your life’s efforts to save up for your future, but you must be careful of the companies you choose to handle your money. This industry has many frauds, and you do not want to find yourself in the middle of some problems.
Birch Gold Group lists all the information you need about precious metal IRAs and their company on their site, including fees and service costs. Since its business launch in 2003, they have become one of the most well-known companies.
They have a wide set of people that can help you achieve your financial goals, including brokers, managers, and financial advisors. With Birch Gold, you can ensure that your investment is safe and your future is secure.
They charge a flat-rate annual fee for their services rather than a percentage from your account. This would benefit investors more, but it can also be expensive for clients with lower balances.
Pros
- Upfront pricing information
- An established name in the industry
- Flexible storage and custodian option
- All four precious metals are available
Cons
- Homepage prompts request for personal information when navigating the site
- Some reviews say that their pricing is not transparent
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What Is A Precious Metal IRA?
Precious Metal IRAs are self-directed retirement accounts. They allow the investment of a wide variety of assets that can hold long-term value, including real estate, cryptocurrency, and precious metals.
They are not like traditional IRAs, which only allow holdings of paper assets. They have the same contribution limits and regulations, enabling you to own gold and other physical precious metals.
Usually, it requires the holder of a custodian to manage the assets for you. It can be an effective way to diversify your retirement plan, as gold has historically proven valuable.
Stocks, bonds, and mutual funds are not ideal assets in a global recession. Market fluctuations affect their value deeply, leading your money to go down.
However, know that you will not be allowed to keep your precious metals at home upon purchasing them through a self-directed IRA. They will be stored in a secured facility until it is time for you to liquidate them.
A self-directed gold or silver IRA may be subjected to the same regulations as a standard IRA. Still, they have more complex rules to ensure asset safety and fraud-free transactions, including tax reporting and recordkeeping.
Gold IRAs are rarely available in standard brokerage firms. If you are interested, you will need to find a separate precious metals IRA company or a custodian specializing in these IRA accounts.
Custodians help navigate the process down to the proper management of reporting requirements. They can also handle the storage logistics when choosing a trusted third-party depository or bank, as the IRS requires.
You should know that precious metals IRAs have additional expenses and fees, unlike a traditional IRA account. These are the fees that you can expect upon opening a self-directed precious metals IRA:
- Cash-out fees
- Custodian fees
- One-time account setup fee
- Seller’s fee
- Storage fees
Keep in mind that gold is not immune to volatility. Their price also fluctuates, but less than other investments. Still, there is always a risk in investing. You have to choose an asset that will ensure wealth security and return in the future.
Advantages of Precious Metals IRAs
Investing in precious metals IRA can provide several benefits to the investors, mainly diversity, opportunity, safety, and control.
Precious Metals IRA Allows for Asset Diversification
Diversification is the best thing to do when planning for retirement. As the old proverb says, “never put all of your eggs in only one basket.” Some assets can be riskier, so it’s a bet to have several options to secure your wealth.
As much as possible, you would want to keep your money on stable assets and be more likely to have reliable returns over time.
Financial and economic crises can have significant effects on retirement investments. Fortunately, precious metals are an excellent alternative to keep your hard-earned money secure even when the world hits rock bottom. They are more resilient and likely to survive such events.
It is advised for long-term investment to diversify within tangible assets. They are more profitable and come with financial benefits. It varies for different kinds of bullion in holding strategies to provide maximum security for your wealth.
Precious metals, especially gold, tend to move in the opposite direction as U.S. stock prices. During undesirable times, they serve as a cushion against fluctuations.
Keeping precious metals in your self-directed IRA can be enough to keep you relieved and content in the long run. Still, invest only some of your savings in precious metals. It is recommended to allocate only under 10% of your total savings to this asset.
Your retirement portfolio should include the following assets for better wealth security:
- Bonds
This can be in individual bonds (municipal, government, corporate, etc.) or broad index funds. Historically, they were able to provide decent returns on investments with much lower volatility.
- Equities (stocks)
Equities can provide the best returns but also have more volatility and risks. They often consist of broad index funds and individual stocks.
- Other assets
This could be in real estate, cryptocurrency, or precious metals. They can be risky, but their value primarily depends on the stock market. They make great efforts for asset diversification.
Precious Metals IRA Provides Opportunity
In the recent crises the world faced in the last years, precious metals have performed well. Some experts also predict that they are most likely to retain that strength in the coming years.
Even for short-term, medium-term, and long-term investments, they make significant assets that will ensure wealth security.
You can never go wrong with adding precious metals to your investment portfolio. They are a limited resource and cannot be destroyed, thus ensuring a maintained value. If their supply runs out, their price will likely increase.
Gold is sometimes considered rare because other elements do not corrode its raw material. It is also not affected by inflation when the prices of goods and services go up.
If your primary concern is the effect of inflation on your money, you will benefit from precious metals. Gold is the most popular precious metal, and it’s been used as a currency for the longest time.
It is also often associated with power and wealth across generations. Gold and silver can make you feel more successful, whether for an investment, jewelry, or decorative items.
A Precious Metals IRA Provides Safety
Precious metals act as a haven for investors. Unlike paper assets, they do not get devalued easily influenced by global crises. They can never fall to zero, bringing peace of mind to their investors.
Retirement accounts are stored in high-security facilities until distribution begins. A custodian and a third-party depository manage them.
They have not been subjected to the same volatility as other assets as stocks suffer. When the market crashes due to unforeseeable events, the value of precious metals will increase rather than go down with them.
In an economic downturn, precious metals are the best way to protect your wealth. It serves as insurance for your retirement policies.
Precious Metals IRA Offers Control
Self-directed IRAs provide a level of control that you would not be able to find in any other type of retirement savings. You can decide which assets go into your account, their allocation, and redistribution while providing tax advantages.
You are also able to choose a pre-determined set of assets.
During distributions, you can also choose if you want to sell the precious metals and accept cash funds or take them as physical deliveries. Precious metals IRA offers flexibility to the account owner. You will have all the control over your losses, gains, and degree of risks.
What Precious Metals Can You Invest For Retirement?
You can invest gold, silver, palladium, and platinum in a precious metals IRA. However, there are specific grades and purity these precious metals must meet to incorporate into a retirement account.
The IRS requires the following standard for precious metals explicitly:
- Gold – 99.5% pure
- Silver – 99.9% pure
- Platinum – 99.95% pure
- Palladium – 99.95% pure
Acceptable bullions include Canadian Maple Leaf coins, PAMP Suisse bars, and Australian Koala coins. IRS also allows holding American Eagle Coins even if they’re not able to meet the criteria of at least 99.5% purity for gold.
Investors cannot hold collectible or rare coins in their account, including Swiss Francs, German Marks, and British Sovereigns.
Gold
Gold is the most popular precious metal and also the most investible. Its durability is one of the primary reasons why people love them. In addition to that, they also have shaping capabilities and conduct both heat and electricity.
Gold has numerous uses aside from being an asset. It is widely used for jewelry, dentistry, and electronic works. People in the old times often turned to gold during economic or political turbulence.
Nowadays, there are numerous ways you can invest in gold. You can purchase gold coins, bars, and jewelry. It is also possible to buy gold stocks (shares from gold mining, royalty companies, and streaming), gold-focused mutual funds, and gold-focused exchange-traded funds (ETFs).
All of them have their ups and downs. The drawbacks are usually rooted in storing physical gold and the possibility of underperformance of Gold ETFs and stocks versus the value of physical gold.
On the other hand, the advantage of owning gold assets comes from their physical value.
Silver
Silver is the second most-sought after precious metal among all fours. Its uses are mainly as an industrial metal for electrical and electronics. Silver is also essential in solar panels due to its electrical properties.
Its role as an industrial metal significantly affects its price volatility, unlike gold. It may also affect the silver stock prices. In rare cases, silver can outperform the value of gold when the demand is high for investments and industrial use.
Platinum
Platinum is among the platinum-group metals (PGM), which includes rhodium, ruthenium, palladium, iridium, and osmium. The six have the same properties and occur naturally in the same mineral deposits.
Like silver, platinum is mainly used as an industrial metal. They are vital in the automotive industry, especially in making catalytic converters that help reduce emissions from vehicle exhaust.
The computer industry and the petroleum and refining sectors also use platinum. Jewelry is sometimes made out of it as well. The rarity of this precious metal holds significant investment value but less than silver and gold.
Palladium
Palladium is also one of the PGM, and it is essential for its industrial uses. Most electronic companies use palladium for their products, as well as in dentistry, chemical applications, jewelry, medicine, and groundwater treatment.
Investors usually put less emphasis on these precious metals than others, but it remains unique and rare.
How Much Of Your IRA Should Include Precious Metals?
Suppose you choose to invest some of your money in a precious metals IRA, be sure to do it carefully. Even though gold is a relatively safe asset, putting all your savings into it is risky.
Experts suggest you invest no more than 5% to 10% of your funds in precious metals. The reasoning for this is the diversified asset in your retirement portfolio.
In this way, you would not take the unnecessary risk that would bring more harm than good to your wealth. If specific financial advisors advise you to invest more than this percentage, they are more likely to be untrustworthy.
In addition, precious metals have performed better than other assets in the past years. However, if you plan to grow your investment, it will not work well with precious metals.
No asset remains safe. It is still susceptible to volatility in certain events.
Their price may rise when the market is struggling, but they will also fall immediately once the stock market recovers. High-quality bonds, or Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities (TIPS), are better options if you want higher security and a better hedge from inflation.
How To Open A Precious Metal IRA
When opening a self-directed IRA and investing in precious metals, it can be a more complicated process to do on your own than when opening a traditional IRA.
Here’s a short set of steps to make it happen:
1. Select a self-directed IRA custodian
Custodians handle self-directed IRAs. It can be trust companies, banks, and other entities recognized by the IRS (Internal Revenue Service).
They allow investors to have alternative assets, including real estate and precious metals.
2. Choose a precious metals dealer
After choosing a trustworthy and reliable custodian, the next step is to select a precious metals dealer.
The IRA custodian will send the money to your chosen dealer to purchase gold, silver, platinum, and palladium.
Doing your research before pursuing this step is best to ensure that your money is safe. You would want one that has an established legacy in the industry.
There are many precious metals IRA company providers out there that will suit your budget and asset needs. You can also ask your custodian if they have connections and relationships with specific companies that can potentially be your dealer.
3. Decide what products to buy
The good thing about self-directed IRAs is that you can choose which assets will be in your account. Other retirement accounts have a predetermined set of assets, but this is different.
You will work with a dealer in selecting which products to buy. The most common gold bullion investors choose the American Eagle Coin that the U.S. Mint issued.
4. Choose a depository
Gold IRA companies must store all the precious metals you purchase through an individual retirement account in an IRS-approved depository, and most common facility investors choose the Delaware Depository.
If you’re still trying to figure out where to put them, you can ask your custodian to recommend your best options. Be sure that the facility you will choose meets the standard set forth by the Internal revenue Code.
Storing precious metals purchased through an IRA at home is strictly prohibited and will be subjected to penalties.
5. Complete the transaction
After choosing the depository, They will store your precious metals, and you can complete the purchase process. Your custodian will handle all the payments from your fund, and your dealer will ship the precious metals to the depository.
They will inform you of the actions happening in your account.
How Do You Make a Withdrawal from a Precious Metal IRA?
When making a withdrawal from your precious metals IRA, you will have two options:
In-Kind Distributions
As the account owner, you can have the precious metals shipped to you after distribution. They will come in bars and coin bullions, and you can do anything you want with them after receipt.
Depository Purchase
In this option, the depository you stored your precious metals in can purchase them and give you the equivalent investment value. It can be through wire or check based on your preference.
Both options will require a custodian to do the transaction. They are still subject to IRA rules, so you must follow them. Some assets appreciate over time when left in the account for a couple of years. You can withdraw them with tax penalties upon withdrawal based on the tax advantage you have.
It would be best if you began taking required minimum distributions (RMDs) upon turning 72. They can be complicated as you will be forced to take them in intervals that would match the whole piece of precious metals you own.
This can lead you to withdraw more than you usually do if you are dealing with U.S. dollars. Taking in-kind distributions will have you sell your precious metals immediately to pay the taxes you owe after the precious metals are shipped.
The IRA withdrawal rules for precious metals are the same for all IRAs. The IRS requires a 10% penalty for the value you withdrew early from the account.
You are only allowed to withdraw without penalty when you turn 59 and a half. This can last until you are 70 and a half if you want to wait to touch your funds immediately after retirement. This allows your investment to grow more in another 11 years.
Note that taking RMDs can only be done by December 31, when you turn 70 and a half. It can be postponed until the 1st of April by the following year, but there will be penalties if you fail.
The rules set by the IRS are final, but certain events may allow you to withdraw early from the account without having to pay additional fees and penalties. They are as follows:
- The account owner suffers from a disability
- The account owner needs funds to pay for insurance due to being unemployed
- The account owner needs money to pay for medical bills due to hospitalization
- The account owner makes an identical amount of equity withdrawals in their expected lifespan. This is referred to as substantially equal periodic payments.
- The account owner or immediate family member requires a fund to pay for ‘qualified’ education. This includes fees for books, tuition, board, room, and other related expenses.
- The account owner can use up to $10,000 of the fund to buy their first-time house.
- The account’s beneficiary needs withdrawals to fund the account owner’s recent passing.
Final Thoughts – Precious Metals IRA
Among the precious metals IRA companies listed above, one truly stands out from the rest: Augusta Precious Metals. They have the best reputation among IRA companies, and you rarely receive complaints about their products and services.
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They earned an A+ rating from the Better Business Bureau, which signifies their commitment to providing a high-quality investment for their clients.
When planning for your future, you should work with a company that has your financial state in its best interest. They must be genuinely concerned about providing a better retirement life, which is what Augusta Precious Metals has to offer.
Augusta Precious Metals also provides a wide selection of articles that can help you learn more about how the market and industry work. This works well if you are a beginner with such investments. You can see real people’s stories of how the company has helped them in the last few years.
If you believe the company is not the right fit for you, you can always check out the other precious metals IRA providers listed above!