Money Monday: Creative investing gone bad

No doubt you’ve heard the pitch on the radio -- buy physical gold as part of your investment strategy.

Having a diversified portfolio is always a good thing, but when you do things like put this gold into an individual retirement account you can run into trouble.

Case in point: A Rhode Island couple bought physical gold, put it in a safe and opened a real estate LLC and called it an IRA. The IRS looked at this and said no, that’s against the rules.

In the end the couple who’d saved and worked hard all their lives made a costly decision: The IRS hit them for roughly $350,000 in fines and taxes.

So what’s the takeaway here?

Never allow fear to push you into bad investing decisions.

And before you do anything that’s outside the norm check with an expert who knows the rules and can guide you so you don’t lose the fortune you’ve worked so hard to attain.

And while you are at it make certain the investment advisor you are working with is legit and good with the federal government -- you don’t want to compound this problem.

Further reading:

• www.wsj.com/articles/a-couple-stored-ira-gold-at-home-they-owe-the-irs-more-than-300-000-11638527410
• www.irs.gov/retirement-plans/investments-in-collectibles-in-individually-directed-qualified-plan-accounts
• www.investopedia.com/terms/g/gold-ira.asp
• www.investopedia.com/articles/retirement/11/impermissable-retirement-investments.asp
• www.investopedia.com/retirement/finding-custodian-selfdirected-ira/

More: Money Monday section