Do you know of...

he is trying to accomplish having someone to talk to.....no friends and a needy personality equals too many posts

 

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I wanted to say that, but was afraid of the rules. Wanna, wanna, wanna...

 

Now this is funny..................

 

Einstein had some great economic theories. E=MC2 or broken down E (May personal Economic goals and desires) are always Equal to MC (My personal Money/Cash) Squared. He also had the theory of Relativity. If your income is large, you have a large house and therefore Relative. Or as in my case, a small house.

 

Tim: Why are you "investing" in PMs? PMs have historically maintained pace with inflation. The difference has been 4 percent over inflation, IN AGGREGATE, since the Great Depression. To answer your other question, you need to find a financial institution willing to hold the PMs in trust in your IRA. It's one of the worst ideas ever. You basically overpay in fees so that you can have "physical metals" in a "paper account." The extra fees go toward the additional accounting and fiduciary standards that must be met in order for the institution to prove to the gov't that the metals are in the IRA.

Now, on top of everything else, you need to have enough cash in your IRA to purchase the metals. Similar to how you would need $500k+ in your IRA to "buy a house in your IRA," you would need enough cash in your IRA to "take delivery" of the PMs into your IRA. Typically, you'd need to purchase larger blocks of metals, so you'd likely need $20k+ in your IRA before you can take delivery of anything. This doesn't mean you SHOULD do this with a $20k IRA, as that would be 100% of your retirement being placed into PMs, and you'd have no cash leftover to pay the fees.

Here's a general breakdown of the fees:

$100-$200 initial set-up
$50-$800 annual custodial fees (Typically this includes storage fees.)

You're looking at $150 in fees that you'll pay in the first 366 days of opening your account. Then, you're required to purchase Silver/Gold/Platinum American Eagles or other specific allowed bullion (although they expanded the list of allowable investments, I don't know what they are, so I don't want to give false information). Again, you must have enough cash in your IRA to make the purchase. Also, the company that you purchase the metals from must be approved to deliver the metal to the custodian of your IRA (your financial institution's designated agent).

As members have told you in other threads in the past:

1) Take care of your debt. If you're paying service on your debt, that is non-tax deductible, and it's essentially a negative investment in a sunk cost. If you owe $2000 at 13%, you should pay off that $2000 before putting the $2000 into an IRA. That 13% that you save is the same as "earning" 14.94% tax free. This assumes the simplest of computations ($460 per year), and actually implies that your "earnings" will be higher, closer to 18%. Again, TAX FREE!

2) Store up a month's worth of expenses in your checking account, at least. This is your cash flow account. You would deposit EXACTLY the month of expenses into this account from your paycheck. This is NOT your reserve. This is just your basic expense account.

3) Put the entire excess into a savings account (because, honestly, I don't trust that you'll be able to earmark the money in your checking account and not spend it) until you've saved three months of expenses. This will be your baseline cash reserve.

4) Once you have three months saved, put the excess into a simple savings Roth IRA with your bank. This might seem silly, but given your history of financial problems, you need to have more liquidity than most individuals. Once you have three months of expenses saved into your Roth account, you should contact a low fee (like Vanguard) IRA provider to invest your excess into. Again, since you have a history of financial problems, I'd suggest that you put 80% into the investment IRA and 20% into the savings IRA.

5) Once you've saved $2,000 in your investment IRA, place the entire amount into the most aggressive mutual fund that your risk tolerance allows. Build from there.

6) Once you've accumulated $200,000 in your investment IRA, a month's worth of expenses (including your mortgage, by that time) in your checking account, three month's worth of expenses in a savings account, and three month's worth of expenses in a savings Roth IRA account with your local bank, you can consider putting money into a PM IRA.

Before any moderators say I took this off topic, or any members say I'm picking on Tim, I'm merely responding to his questions in a way that is broad enough that most could use this advice, yet specific enough that it talks to his situation. I don't know how much debt Tim (or any other individual) might have, nor the rate that they're paying.

The only time that I've advocated for the investment in PMs was when: A) The silver : gold ratio exceeded 65 (buy silver or sell gold) or was below 30 (buy gold or sell silver) or B) The gold : platinum ratio exceeded 0.8 (buy platinum or sell gold). Essentially, playing arbitrage in the metals. I would not advocate for any individual expecting appreciation (relative to inflation) in the long-run to invest in PMs. They're hedges against inflation, not vehicles for long-term growth.

Edit: Tim, I was meaning to add that you'll never be able to get the same returns in your IRA that you state you're able to get on a regular basis, such as this:

 

It's easier to get forgiven than to get permission.

 

Spot on NK, I really hope that nobody considers rock solid advice as "picking"