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October 10, 2025 14 mins

Gold is breaking records again—and smart investors are taking notice. In this episode of the Directed IRA Podcast, Mat Sorensen and Mark Kohler explain how to buy physical gold, silver, and other precious metals inside your IRA, the right way.

They walk through which metals qualify, how purity standards and approved coins work, and what IRS rules you need to follow for storage and compliance. You’ll also learn how a self-directed IRA opens the door to these alternative investments, so you can diversify your retirement beyond stocks and mutual funds.

If you’ve ever thought about owning real gold bars (not just ETFs or paper gold) inside your IRA, this episode breaks it all down step by step—no myths, no confusion, just clear guidance from the experts at Directed IRA.


Chapters: 

00:00:06 - Why Precious Metals In IRAs

00:24 - What You Can And Cannot Buy

02:52 - Purity Standards And Qualifying Coins

05:47 - Self-Directed IRA Setup And Funding

08:42 - Storage Rules And IRS Compliance

11:24 - Costs, Dealers, And Next Steps

13:18 - Education, Disclaimers, And Wrap-Up

Directed IRA Homepage: https://directedira.com/

Directed IRA Explore (Linktree): https://linktr.ee/SelfDirectedIRA

Book a Call: https://directedira.com/appointment/


Other:
Mat Sorensen: https://matsorensen.com & https://linktr.ee/MatSorensen
KKOS: https://kkoslawyers.com
Main Street Business https://mainstreetbusiness.com



Mark as Played
Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Mark J. Kohler (00:06):
Welcome everybody to the Directed IRA
podcast.
My name is Mark Kohler.
I'm here with the amazing MatSorenson.
And today we are talking abouthow to invest in precious metals
inside your retirement account.
I mean, this is exciting.
You could buy gold, silver, thecubic zirconian.
Is that how you say it?
You can buy that, right?

Mat Sorensen (00:24):
You can't buy that one.
We're going to go through thelist of what you can and can't
buy.
But gold is on the list, andgold hit new highs.
So for any of you that havealready been investing in gold,
congrats to you.
You've been making some goodmoney.
$3,800 an ounce right now iswhere gold was last trading at.
So, but you can own this as anasset class.
And I know a lot of peoplethink of gold as maybe being or

(00:45):
precious metals sometimes beinglike a counterbalance to the
stock market, but the stockmarket's hitting new highs, and
we have gold also hitting newhighs.
Um, we can get into the reasonswhy on that maybe and speculate
here.
But the good news is that'sbeen an asset that's been
performing well.
So we want to talk about howcan your IRA own this?
Like the actual physical metal,like the actual gold bar, how

(01:08):
can it own that metal um in yourIRA?

Mark J. Kohler (01:11):
Yeah, and a couple of insights here.
We once interviewed someonehere on our podcast that
actually had a gold bar.
And I was like, I want to seethis thing.
Because, you know, James Bondand you know, Goldfinger, these
things were massive.
And uh he held it up and it waslike the size of a cell phone.
I'm like, what?
That's a gold bar becausethat's that's a pound right
there.
I'm like, geez.

(01:32):
Uh but uh it was pretty cool.
But the don't listen to anyoneout there.
There's a lot of badinformation about the myths of
you can't buy gold because youcan't, you know, put it in your
house and you can't do this, youcan't do that.
And and so it's really some badinformation has put a chilling
effect on this.
But you can do it and do itright is super easy.

Mat Sorensen (01:54):
Yeah, and so if you're someone that loves
precious metals or believed inthat asset class, invested in
it, we want to talk about howyour IRA can do this.
Now even your Roth IRA,traditional IRA.
Um, we're gonna go through anumber of things, like what
precious metals qualify, how youactually purchase them, how do
I get this account set up so Ican actually buy precious metals
in my IRA?
I'm not doing that at Fidelity.

(02:15):
Like maybe I can do buy theETF, but I can't buy the
physical metals.
What are the storagerequirements of this?
And then some of the kind ofdo's and don'ts and some of the
things that we've seen over theyears.
So let's start the first pointon this, which is what precious
metals qualify here.

Mark J. Kohler (02:29):
Mat, does it put does the coins and pirates of
the Caribbean do those word Jackexperts?
It depends.

Mat Sorensen (02:36):
It depends.
Let's talk about it here,actually.
That's serious, that's a goodquestion.
Um, that movie was fake though,but just you know, don't hate
to burst your bubble.
But you know what I mean.
Don't you start talking aboutSanta Claus?
I mean, yeah, but we'll gothere.
But let's talk about the goldcoins.
So um, gold is one of thequalifying metals, silver,
platinum, and palladium.

(02:57):
Now, the two most popular thatwe see in IRAs are gonna be
gold.
Now, I'm going to my own bookhere, by the way, the
self-directed IRA Handbook,because I have a chapter on
this, and there are specificrequirements on, let's say,
gold.
There's two things you thatmeet the gold.
It's not just any gold you canbuy with an IRA.
It has to either be meet purityrequirements.
So that coin in Pirates of theCaribbean, if it met the purity

(03:20):
requirement, it counts.
Or it can be qualifying becauseit's from the a
government-approved mint or agovernment, let's say.
So, like for example, the USMint puts out American Eagle
coins.
Those automatically qualify.
All right.
So either way, either thepurity requirement or um a

(03:41):
government-issued type of coin.

Mark J. Kohler (03:44):
And the Iraqi dinar would not qualify.

Mat Sorensen (03:47):
Yeah, that's currency.
So that is on paper, that isabsolutely worthless.

Mark J. Kohler (03:54):
I know.
It sounds like gold.
Well, we had, oh my gosh, doyou remember those scams 10
years ago?

Mat Sorensen (03:58):
Everybody was buying Iraqi dinar is going to
revalue.
It was like, all right, whatare you smoking?

Mark J. Kohler (04:05):
But yeah, um I think this is a really good
thing, though, to diversify intoas well.
And and I think that it's veryrealistic and doable.
And gold has just beenperforming so well.

Mat Sorensen (04:18):
Yeah.
So let me get into the purityrequirements here for any of you
that want to geek out on this.
Gold must be 99.5% pure.
Okay.
That's the minimum they callfitness uh or fineness
requirements uh for gold.
Now the second one is silver.
That that's the second mostpopular precious metal we see
people buy.
And we have people that ownhundreds of millions of precious
metals in their IRA here atdirected IRA.

(04:41):
Um, and silver could be thesame thing.
You could have agovernment-issued silver coin,
um, or if it's a bar of silveror something like that, it could
even be in coin format.
Night bullion is what they maycall it.
99.9% is the finenessrequirement for silver.
Now, I've never seen anyone buyplatinum or palladium.
We might have some people'saccounts that own them here.

(05:02):
They're technically in the taxcode as something approved that
your IRA could own.
Now, generally, the IRS hasrestricted collectibles from
your IRA and said your IRA can'town collectibles.
Like it can't own a coincollection, like a collectible
coin.
It can't own art.
It can't own a wine collection,you know, it can't own those

(05:23):
things, collectible car, but itcould own precious metals.
And there's a specificexclusion in there that says in
this restriction that says, hey,these are collectibles you
can't own, but you can ownprecious metals, gold, silver,
platinum, palladium, as long asthey meet these requirements.

Mark J. Kohler (05:39):
All right.
Now, I don't know in our lineuphere, but I feel prompted to
say this to everybody right now.
Now that you know you can dothis, the the big step of how is
getting the self-directed IRAso that you can do this.
So we're gonna break that downas well, but don't get stressed
or frustrated right now ifyou're like, well, I want to do

(06:00):
this.
Um, where do I start?
Well, it starts by having theright type of IRA that allows
for this.

Mat Sorensen (06:08):
Yeah.
And that's not gonna be theFidelity IRA or the broker
dealer IRA, right?
So that's what we do as adirected IRA.
We have a self-directed IRA.
So let's say you have an oldemployer 401k of traditional
dollars, or you got atraditional IRA at Charles
Schwab, or you know, what wewill do is you'll set up a
self-directed traditional IRA atdirected IRA, and then we let

(06:29):
you invest in whatever you want.
You want to buy real estate,you want to buy crypto, you want
to buy precious metals.
We don't restrict you to justpublicly traded assets.
So we'll let you buy thesetypes of assets.
Some people call themalternative.
I don't know how alternativegold is, but um, but you can buy
these in your in your IRA.
So we open up the account foryou, you'll transfer that money
over, and our team does this foryou.

(06:50):
We'll make a transfer requestto Merrill Lynch or Charles
Schwab, wherever your money'sat.
That money pops into your IRAwith us, still a tax-qualified
account, tax preferred.
But now we don't restrict youon what you can invest into.
And you say, hey, I want to buyprecious metals.
Now you'll find a dealer.
We don't sell metals, okay?
Well, we're here to let youinvest whatever you want.
I don't care.
You want to buy preciousmetals, you want to buy gold,

(07:12):
you want to buy silver, you wantto buy start invest in a
startup or buy crypto.
Uh we don't that we don't wedon't have a uh horse in that
race, so to speak.
We just want you to be able toinvest in what you want to.
And so um now we do havedealers that we can refer you to
if you need assistance withthat, with someone that's like,
well, who can I buy preciousmetals from that'll work in my
IRA?
Um, because you want to makesure you're getting the right

(07:33):
precious metals that qualify.
So um, but but our we can referyou in the right direction
there.
So, but so that's what we'redoing here every day.
So we can help get this accountopen, get it funded.
Um, and then remember, this isyour retirement account.
You're building long-termwealth in this, right?
You're building this up.
You're you would do thisbecause you believe in precious
metals, you believe in gold orsilver, whatever it might be, as

(07:55):
being more valuable over timeand going to be growing your
retirement account.
So you have a retirementaccount you're looking forward
to, right?
With a big account.

Mark J. Kohler (08:01):
Yeah.
Now, some of you've boughtprecious metals before, and you
might go to a dealer and go pickthem up and go home and bury
them in the backyard or put themunder your bed or something.
Maybe in the safe or somethinglike that.
Yeah.

Mat Sorensen (08:17):
Oh, that's good, I guess.
Mark's stuck on Pirates of theCaribbean.
He's like, you know, X marksthe spot here.
A treasure chest, maybe.
Yeah with the goblet made ofgold.

Mark J. Kohler (08:33):
Yeah.
Um, so when but that's becauseyou own it personally, you can
be involved in that wholeprocess of buying it, storing
it, and looking at it at nightand petting it, whatever you
want to do with your gold.
But when your IRA is buying it,you want to go through the
right type of vendors that knowyou have an IRA and that can

(08:57):
provide custodianship or holdingit for you in this.
And there's not a lot ofoptions here.
You want to make sure you do itright, but it's it's actually
quite doable and not thatexpensive.
Maybe Mat, walk us through anexample of that.

Mat Sorensen (09:10):
Yeah, there's a storage requirement for precious
metals.
So the tax code has a provisionin it for IRAs that says when
your IRA owns precious metals,they must be stored at a
custodian that is a bank, trustcompany, credit union.
Okay.
So there must be a third-partystorage place for those precious
metals.
And the IRS has come out prettyclearly and said you can't

(09:33):
store these at your home.
Like there's some guidance outfrom the IRS and kind of some
buyer-beware kind of um taxpayernotices that have gone out from
the IRS because they've crackeddown on some people that have
bought precious metals in theirIRA and stored them at home.
If you do that, the IRS deemsthat a distribution.
They consider once thoseprecious metals get to your

(09:54):
house and they're in yourpersonal possession, they deem
that to be a distribution.
So no storage at your home.
So we use a third-party storagefacility.
Um, a lot of companies in thespace use.
You can even go in there.

Mark J. Kohler (10:08):
I thought we were storing all of this gold in
the basement of our building.
That's where you were going.

Mat Sorensen (10:12):
No, no, definitely not.
This this facility that storesit, literally, it knows for
every employee, it knows if youhave a filling in your tooth or
not.
And if you went to the dentistthat day and you didn't update
it, you will get scanned in andout when you go in and out of
this building, and they'll belike, there's metal on you more
than normal.

Mark J. Kohler (10:28):
Wow.

Mat Sorensen (10:29):
Okay, like it is like is literally like a Fort
Knox and lockdown, which is thetype of place you probably want
your metals.
Okay.
I don't want them in thetreasure chest, you know, in the
backyard.
So, um, but this is that's arequirement for the precious
metals owned in your IRA.
They must be stored umaccording to the IRS
requirements, which does notinclude your home.

(10:49):
Now, you can have some personalpossession of them during
transportation if that wasnecessary, um, where your IRA
bought them and you were somehowtransporting them to be
deposited properly.
Generally, that's what you'rejust gonna have is you buy them
from a precious metals dealer,they're gonna ship them to the
depository that stores them, orthat depository, frankly, many

(11:12):
of them have a lot of the metalsin the industry.
They're already sitting on ashelf in there, they're just
moving it to your name in yourIRA as opposed to who just sold
it to you.

Mark J. Kohler (11:21):
So what's what can people expect in a cost?
Um, let's say they bought$10,000 worth of gold or uh
$15,000.
What would the storage cost be?

Mat Sorensen (11:31):
So it could be $100 to $200 annual storage fee.
Now we have uh, you know, aself-directed accountant
directed IRA is $4.95 a yearthat you can invest in any
asset.
Now we do have a specific ifyou're just prying precious
metals, there are some differentdifferent pricing on that uh
where it could be less.
Uh, but you're gonna have anannual storage fee to the

(11:51):
facility of at least $100 ayear.
Uh so just plan on that.
Um, so if you're buying the$10,000, just know you're gonna
be paying at least $100 for thatand maybe $300 to $500 a year
for your IRA account fee withus.
Now that's all consolidatedinto our account fees, and we
handle that for you when youhave a precious metals IRA with
us.
So um, and we, by the way, likeI said, I'm referencing my own

(12:13):
book here on some of thesepoints.
There's a whole chapter in mybook on this.
Um, we have other resources onour website about the qualifying
metals and the rules, and wegot a team here, of course, that
can help you as you're sortingthis out.
And if you're interested inbuying precious metals, like we
talked about at the verybeginning, this has been an
asset that's performed verywell.
Who knows if it's going tocontinue to grow from here?

(12:33):
We're not trying to give youinvestment advice, but we want
to let you know this is anactual option in your IRA.
Like the actual physicalprecious metals, you can own
them in your IRA.

Mark J. Kohler (12:42):
Well, it's and it's uh a short podcast today or
broadcast because it really isthat simple.
It's exciting.
It's something you can do uh injust a few days, getting an
account open.
And we've got incredible uhresources there to help you do
it quickly.
Uh, an online uh app and onyour uh desktop version, you can

(13:04):
be opening an account tonightand started talking with uh
precious metal metal dealerstomorrow.
So it's it's pretty cool.
Um, but anyway, thank youeveryone for being here and
being a part of this amazingmission and journey that Mat and
I are on to kind of educate theworld about this uh
self-directed retirement accountoption that so many people

(13:28):
don't know about.
And we just feel so passionatethat it unlocks true retirement
building that people could onlydream of.
And we are just an honor thatwe are one of your podcasts you
listen to.
Please share it with yourfriends and family.
Give us a thumbs up, five star,10, whatever's, you know, just
10 out of 10.
Yeah.

(13:48):
And uh we'll be back next weekwith and a lot of podcasts
sometimes in between onadditional topics to help you
out and your journey too.
Thanks so much.
See you next week.
And thank you everyone forlistening.
A quick disclaimer andreminder: this presentation does
not constitute an attorney orCPA client relationship, and it
is always in your best interestto consult competent legal and

(14:10):
tax professionals whenconducting your own personal
transactions.

Mat Sorensen (14:14):
We also want to make sure you know this is not
investment advice or financialadvice.
We're just trying to give youeducation, ideas, and strategies
you can take to yourprofessionals or conduct your
own research on.
We'll see you next time.
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