My gold IRA storage fees - Little Rock perspective, what are you guys paying?

Joyce Cooper

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My gold IRA storage fees - Little Rock perspective, what are you guys paying?

joyce_cooper📊Growing (50-100k)

about 1 month ago

Key Takeaways

•Okay, so I'm a principal here in Little Rock, and part of my gig, besides wrangling teenagers, is teaching financial literacy.
•Needless to say, I put my money where my mouth is, and a few years back, I rolled over a chunk of my 403(b) into a Gold IRA.
•We're talking around $75k, which for a public school principal, is a pretty decent chunk of change.

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Okay, so I'm a principal here in Little Rock, and part of my gig, besides wrangling teenagers, is teaching financial literacy. Needless to say, I put my money where my mouth is, and a few years back, I rolled over a chunk of my 403(b) into a Gold IRA. We're talking around $75k, which for a public school principal, is a pretty decent chunk of change. Anyway, I’ve been pretty happy with the move, especially with all the market volatility lately – slept a lot sounder knowing I wasn’t 100% exposed to the tech sector or whatever else is doing flips these days. But my renewal for storage fees just came in, and it got me thinking.

My current custodian is charging me about $200 annually for storage. It’s a flat fee, not percentage-based, which I appreciate, but I'm wondering if that's still competitive. When I first signed up three years ago, I thought it was pretty standard. Now, I see some conflicting info online, and it varies so much by company. What are you all paying for storage? Is it a flat fee, or a percentage of your holdings? And what kind of portfolio size are we talking about for that fee? I’m definitely not trying to nickel and dime, but as someone who preaches smart financial decisions, gotta practice what I preach!

Also, completely unrelated but if any of you are just starting to look into this stuff, I found this Gold IRA Quiz super helpful when I was first trying to wrap my head around it all. It asks some good questions to get you thinking about what kind of account might be best for you. Anyway, back to the storage fees – chime in with your experiences!

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5 comments

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Best Answer▲ 10 upvotes

andrew_roberts👑Elite (1m-5m)

Dude, I feel you on the storage fees. I'm in a similar boat, albeit not a principal, haha. I'm just outside of Atlanta and my gold IRA is roughly the same size, maybe a little more. I'm paying around $200 annually too, which feels a bit steep when I break it down per ounce. Seems like that's just the going rate for insured, segregated storage these days. Curious to see if anyone has found a better deal, especially for smaller portfolios.

Comments (5)

andrew_roberts👑Elite (1m-5m)Real Investor✓ Verified•about 1 month ago

william_davis💎Premium (500k-1m)Real Investor•about 1 month ago

Interesting! So, you mentioned being a principal and teaching financial literacy – are you finding that your Gold IRA experience is influencing what you teach or how you explain investments to your students at all?

ruth_perez📊Growing (50-100k)•about 1 month ago

Honestly, while I get the "put my money where my mouth is" for teaching financial literacy, I'm a bit surprised you went with a Gold IRA for that initial chunk. Considering the long-term historical performance of diversified equity portfolios, especially for someone in your profession with a stable income and likely a solid pension, a Gold IRA might be *too* conservative for a significant portion of your retirement savings. Gold has its place, sure, but as a primary growth driver? Food for thought.

betty_king📊Growing (50-100k)•about 1 month ago

Hey, cool to see a fellow educator diving into Gold IRAs! One thing I learned early on is that storage fees can vary a *lot* depending on whether you're doing segregated or unsegregated storage. Segregated is usually pricier, but your specific bars are kept separate. Unsegregated means your gold is pooled with others. Always worth clarifying with your custodian exactly what you're paying for. This article from Investopedia breaks down the differences pretty well: https://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/090215/segregated-vs-unsegregated-storage-gold-iras.asp