Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts from 2012

How Safe is Gold?

As often happens when the markets are bouncing up and down, some people are turning to the "safe haven" of gold. But how safe is gold? Gold has several attributes that make it attractive: 1) Gold is durable. In fact, some of the gold you buy today was probably mined by the Inca's thousands of years ago. 2) Gold is universal. With very few exceptions, gold always has value. This is true historically. And no matter where you go today you can likely trade gold for other goods either directly or by converting it into the local currency. 3) Gold is portable. While heavy, gold packs a lot of value in a small package. 4) Gold is beautiful. You can store it as jewelry or other decorative art. So if you are looking for an investment that will last a 1000's of years and still hold value, gold is a great commodity. Or if you are looking for something that will be likely to survive a complete societal breakdown like a war. However, when you start to look at likely fin

Self-Directed Real Estate IRA's the New Scam?

You aren't smarter than the market. It really is that simple. You know the marketing folks have been out talking when the New York Times does a fluff story on some new way to make more money with your investments. So watch out for the new scam promoted by the same media advisers who told you a few years ago to buy the most expensive house a lender would finance. Paul Sullivan story is about people'e successful investment of their retirement money in real estate using a self-directed IRA. He provides us with several "success stories".  Of course they are all recent converters to this idea and, not surprising, all but one of the people whose story Sullivan tells are also in real estate sales. The problem isn't really Paul Sullivan. Its that there is no one who makes money by digging out the horror stories from people who invested their retirement funds in real estate at the height of the housing bubble. There aren't any public relations firms devoted to de