Self-Directing 101: The 5 Golden Rules of Self-Directing

What if your retirement account could invest in anything you believe in?

Welcome to Directed IRA's new podcast series, Self-Directing 101. In this series, Mat and Mark will be covering everything you need to know to get started when it comes to self-directed investing. 

Today's Episode: The 5 Golden Rules of Self-Directing

From finding your own deals to avoiding costly mistakes, Mat and Mark cover what actually separates successful investors from the ones who fall off the “magic carpet ride."

If you’re serious about building wealth with a self-directed IRA, this episode is your playbook.

🎧 Tune in now and take control of your retirement.

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

Transcript

Welcome And The Five Rules

SPEAKER_01 0:08

Welcome everyone to the Directed IRA podcast. This is Matt Stornson joined by the incredible Mark J. Kohler. We are two tax lawyers here who love to talk about self-directing, using your retirement accounts to invest in alternative assets. And today we have the five golden rules to self-directing. They're going to come hard and fast today. We want to make sure you know them. Yep.

SPEAKER_00 0:28

These are the five golden rules to see to make sure you succeed. You're in a new world. And uh you're you're on this little Aladdin carpet ride. We want to make sure you don't fall off and you get to, you know, enjoy the ride, look at the stars, have that beautiful song. And this is going to be incredible. So um and Jasmine is there or not? You know, I I can live with Jasmine there. I think she's adorable.

SPEAKER_01 0:56

And for the ladies, you got Aladdin. So you know, just saying. All right. Something for everyone.

Rule One Source The Investment

SPEAKER_00 1:01

They're they're a sweetheart couple, you know? Um okay. These five things are to help you succeed. They're basic concepts that you may know or already practicing two or three of these. But I'm hoping one of these five, you're like, aha, I needed to hear that. So let's get into it, Matt. What is your number one golden rule to self-direct?

SPEAKER_01 1:24

All right, number one, you've got to source an investment. The number one thing about self-directing is you're the one deciding where to invest your account. And that's what we do at Direct at IRA. When you have a self-directed account, you get to invest in the best investment you can find. Not the best investment that Wall Street has for you, not the best investment at Fidelity, not the best investment at the life insurance company or the best annuity they have, just the best investment, period.

SPEAKER_00 1:51

And and this is a tricky one because you're like, well, yeah, I've got to source one. No, no, no, hear me out. With a lot of um brokerage account, for example, the there's an investment advisor that's their job to source an investment and bring it to you. And you've got to take the bull by the horns and realize no one's out there looking for me. This is but now this is the beauty and the curse. Because the beauty is you get to now look at all these other investments and get to choose what you want to do and what's best for you. But at the same token, it's on you. No one else is going to do that for you. So the golden rule is own it.

unknown 2:31

Yeah.

Rule Two Diligence Without Breaking Rules

SPEAKER_01 2:31

And for some people of you, that's scary. For some of you, that's exciting, but you have the potential is unlimited. Okay. All the limitations from the brokerage or Wall Street are taking off. Find the best investment out there because that's what we're trying to get at the end of the day. The greatest return to grow our account and compound over time so we have a retirement account we're looking forward to. Okay, number two. I got a good one.

SPEAKER_00 2:53

Ready for number two? Yeah. Oh, I got one. I got a number two. I got a good one. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 2:58

I was teeing it up for you.

SPEAKER_00 3:00

Oh, okay, okay. I I like these plays on words, so I want to do this one. Treat it like it's your money, but don't. What's that mean? What that means is when you find that investment, it's just weird. Some people are they just feel a little more detached from it. So they feel like they don't do the due diligence they really should. They just they think because it's an IRA or 401k or a Roth, it's one step away. That for some, and maybe it's just slightly, but I see it all the time. They're just not as diligent, vigorous in their due diligence. You and so what people with their own money or their grandma's money, they freaking tear into it. They're doing background checks, they're kicking the tires, they're looking at the property. That's not a prohibited transaction. You look hard at these deals. But then when I say don't treat it like your money, is you've got to realize the prohibited transaction rules exist, and you, it's not your money. It's your IRA's money. But when it comes to due diligence, it is your money.

SPEAKER_01 4:07

I love that.

SPEAKER_00 4:08

Agree with the do you agree with that one?

SPEAKER_01 4:10

Yeah, and that's that's a a good way to think about it because um another thing I'll just add on it when we're talking about your retirement account funds, is these are like sacred funds, another way to think about it, which is they can't have personal use. I'm not trying to make money personally because my retirement account did it. I'm not trying to buy or rent a property that I'm gonna live in and have personal use of, right? I'm not trying to abuse it. Think of it as sacred funds in that like these are the most important funds I have, the best tax advantage funds I have. So, like the I want to put it in the very best investment that I really believe in the most because I get to keep all of the returns coming from it in a Roth IRA, or it's all tax deferred in a traditional account. So even better because when I win on those, I really win more because of the tax advantages.

SPEAKER_00 4:56

Okay, number three. Okay, Matt, I even have an awesome four and five, I think. So I'm gonna tee this up for you, my dear friend.

Rule Three Choose The Right Funds

SPEAKER_01 5:03

We might get to eight then. Okay. Yeah. What's your number three? My number three is because we're talking about your self-directed retirement account, we need to start thinking about what are the retirement funds I'm using for this? If I'm new to self-directing in particular, do I have that brokerage IRA that I'm gonna roll over that's currently in an ETF or a mutual fund that don't even know? Is this my old employer 401k? We got to start thinking of the funds we're gonna use here. Maybe there's a new contribution, but what's this investment gonna take? Is it 50K? Is it 100K? Is it 300K? What is the amount here? How do I I want to make sure I know in my brain here what retirement account funds I'm pulling from? And you might have been need to think about ahead of this when you think about what investment I am looking for, because that investment might be 100K, 300k, half a million, whatever. But be thinking about the retirement account funds you're gonna pull from here. You're gonna need a self-directed account. I'll talk about that, but I think it's good to get in your head right now. What am I getting out of? Because if you have a retirement account at TD Ameritrade that's in an ETF, you're gonna sell that position to get to cash to come over here. You're generally doing that because you think it'll do better.

unknown 6:18

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 6:18

If I could add to your number three, I'm gonna add a couple dimensions. And I love it. You're thinking about you're thinking about the where's this money coming from? How much do I need? La la la. I just want to open up the can of worms that you might have multiple accounts that you could pull from and pool. You might want to open up the LLC concept and pool accounts of other family members and say, hey, my wife or husband has an account. I want to pool those. Now, I'm just saying that, everyone. You're new to this, maybe. We have other podcasts on using the IRA LLC. Just don't feel my point to maths number three is I don't want you to feel limited. If you need more money for that perfect investment, oh, you can get there. It's maybe you pull some from some other older accounts or pool other accounts from family. It's it's not prohibited to do that. Um, and there's ways to do it. Okay. Can I you okay with that?

SPEAKER_01 7:16

Yeah.

Rule Four Aim For Base Hits

SPEAKER_00 7:17

All right. Okay, number four. Now, in this number four, um, I'm Brad Pitt. Okay, this is a very important point. And Matt, your character, is it Noah? What's his name? I'm Jonah. Jonah Hill. Jonah Hill. You're Jonah Hill and I'm Brad Pitt. Let's make sure we're straight on this one. Okay. Number four. You do not need to swing for a home run. You do not need to hurt yourself swinging so hard to make big money on this first deal that you make a mistake. People Jonah, what's it about? I'm gonna clack, I'm gonna go like this and point at you. It's what is it, Jonah?

SPEAKER_01 7:58

Base hits? You just need to get on base.

SPEAKER_00 8:00

There you go. Okay, now for those that are money ball fans, that was a famous scene, and I'm trying to have fun with it here. But the point is base hits. Long-term game. People, you got nine innings. Do not overdo it. Yes, it's cool. You can hit some home runs here that you would never be able to hit at Fidelity, but you don't want to get over anxious. Just when you're shooting for base hits, once in a while, you're gonna hit a home run. And that's great. Just focus on base hits and you'll be surprised what happens.

Rule Five Get Documents Right

SPEAKER_01 8:37

Yeah, and I'll just give you an example when we say base hits. That that might be the boring rental property. That might be private lending secured on the asset, okay? This might not be the new cryptocurrency that's gonna go 1,000 X or the startup that nine out of 10 of them fail, but it sounds super cool, okay? Like there's some risk and return basics here to think about. And we get into self-directing because the world is your oyster, you can start getting a little more risky to chase higher yield. But you want to make sure you're being smart about it and not taking on unnecessary risk if the return is not there. Okay, number five. I got number five. Make sure the investment documentation is all correct. We see this, there's two facets of this. Okay, so I got a part A and part B here. Um, I don't want to say, you know, five, six or six, seven, but um that was for the kids. But I'm just saying A B, okay, A B here is there's two things on the investment docs. One, this needs to be in the name of your IRA. When you're investing with your self-directed IRA, let's say this is me making investing in a private fund that I found. Okay. And then I'm putting 50 grand into it, private fund doing something cool I'm excited about. And that 50K on that subscription document and the investment documents, it's not Matt Stornson investing, it's directed trust company, FBO Matt Stornson's Roth IRA. Okay. That's the subscriber investor in that deal. So the investment documents need to be in the IRA's name. That's part A. Part B is make sure that the investment documents actually represent what the deal is. And Mark and I have done due diligence podcasts before, top 10 due diligence items. We have articles on this of things to be thinking about. But one of the most important on those is make sure you understand the documents and the documents reflect what you've been communicated. A lot of people get sold on an investment, private investments, and they're told this and that. And then it's nowhere to be found in the actual investment documents. But it's actually a critical reason of why you decided to invest. So just make sure the documents reflect your actual understanding of the deal.

SPEAKER_00 10:44

Okay. All right. I love that. And making sure your document and it kind of relates to that due diligence, but it it but it's the second part. You need to really drill down on the due diligence, but then you can't cut corners on documents. I knew this guy once that said bad documents make a good deal bad. You hear that, people? Bad documents can make a great deal bad. I stole that from Matt Sorensen.

SPEAKER_01 11:16

Yeah, yeah. He has to pay, he has to pay me a nickel every time that he says that. So contract that royalty on that.

Bonus Learn Prohibited Transaction Safety

SPEAKER_00 11:23

On that. It'll be in the mailbox. Your mailbox money. Okay. Now I've got number six. You may say we're done at this point.

SPEAKER_01 11:30

I like it. Let's give him a bonus. You know.

SPEAKER_00 11:31

Oh, you want to this is the bonus, or you got a bonus?

SPEAKER_01 11:34

This is the bonus? I let you, you get the bonus.

SPEAKER_00 11:36

Okay, here's my bonus. I I'm trying to find I've got some several words here. Matt kind of doesn't like this these words, but I'm gonna try to make sure it's good. Do not forget gun safety. Now what I mean by that. Gun safety, like hunter safety, is learning how to handle a firearm. Don't point it at people. Make sure when it's loaded, treat it always like it's loaded. La la. Matt and I are both scout masters, and we had to teach kids, even with a BB gun, what's gun safety. Well, people, you're dealing with a pretty cool strategy here. It could argue, you know, it could it'll be a little dangerous. You have got to know the rules. Do not skip over our podcasts on prohibited transactions. You need to know the rules of the game. They're not just gonna, and you can't use the excuse. Well, I didn't know the rules. Bless your heart. Um that doesn't cut it. So you've it's on you to know the rules of the game. And Matt and I will make sure you know them backwards and forwards. This podcast should be a regular podcast for you for the many, many more months until you feel like you could teach a class to your family about this. You've got to know the rules of the game and know the gun safety because you're dealing with a loaded weapon here. And you want to be careful with that.

SPEAKER_01 12:58

Yeah. And I'll say we in addition to the podcast, we have our self-directed IRA summit coming up April 17th. That's a full day on self-directing. If you're a client at directed IRA, it's free. Or a new client, you're a client or a law firm KQS lawyers. You get to come to this for free. Go to SDIRA summit.com. Anyone can go, you got to pay. This is virtual, but I'm just saying, if you're a customer of ours, um, reach out to our individual offices, or it should be in your newsletters, just check your newsletters for the code to attend that for free. But that's a full day getting into those rules. Mark was talking about. Um, we should give you a certificate at the end, kind of like you get, you know, at uh Hunter Safety, you know, or maybe even a merit badge. Maybe we'll create a self-directed IRA merit badge or something. Who knows? Yeah. Um but uh but it's a great time. You get a network with other investors, learn about strategies, and of course the rules to make sure you're staying compliant and up to speed on what matters.

SPEAKER_00 13:49

Yeah. I, you know, it's funny. I wanted to say this too. When Matt and I were scout masters, um, there's actually a little safety card that the boys have to earn before they can play with their pocket knife around the campfire. And uh, hey, when you're a scout and you're an adult says, Hey, does anybody have a knife? Oh, that is the moment a boy becomes a man. Because he'll be like, I got a knife, and they flip out their knife and give it to an adult in the proper way. That is a big moment. But before the kid can get there, they have to pass off um a special little card that shows they know how to handle a knife. And uh, much to their mother's chagrin, we send them home with knives and their little card. And then, you know, I get nasty phone calls for a week. But you know what? These kids, they gotta, they gotta learn. And uh when you when you get a a self a self-directed uh account, you gotta know how to run that account. You know, like how do how do I handle it? And it is such a powerful tool that will change your life, change the trajectory of your family, your retirement. And once you know the rules to that game, oh my gosh, you freaking own it. It's amazing.

Closing Thoughts And Disclaimers

SPEAKER_01 15:08

Yeah, we've got all, like we said, we got all the resources and tools here. Our team's available too. Um, you can book a call with our new account team at directed IRA.com if you're like, oh, I got some questions on this. Um, we're here to help and be a resource to you. And if you need the deep dive with the lawyer, you're into really technical stuff. We have a law firm, KQS lawyers as well. So we got all the resources for you. We like to say self-directing your IRA, even though we are we're making it making a serious point here. Um, it's but it's not rocket science. It's more like learning a board game. You just need to learn it, figure out how to work it, whether it's the pocket knife, the BB gun, the archery, whatever it is. Um, there's just a few things to learn, but it um but it it can be exciting once you learn the rules and empowering by being able to invest in the things you know and believe in the best to grow and build your retirement. So thanks everyone for tuning in, of course, to the Directed IRA podcast. Make sure you're gonna get over to directed Ira.com slash podcast and catch all the episodes there. We'll see you next week. Until then, stay calm, self-direct on.

SPEAKER_00 16:06

And thank you everyone for listening. A quick disclaimer and reminder: this presentation does not constitute an attorney or CPA client relationship, and it is always in your best interest to consult competent legal and tax professionals when conducting your own personal transactions.

SPEAKER_01 16:23

We also want to make sure you know this is not investment advice or financial advice. We're just trying to give you education, ideas, and strategies you can take to your professionals or conduct your own research on. We'll see you next time.