Somewhere in the gold marketing universe, a very strange idea took hold.
The idea is that if you want to own gold, you need a gold IRA. That it is the proper, serious, tax-smart way to do it, and buying coins any other way is somehow amateur hour.
This is backwards, and it is backwards on purpose, because a gold IRA involves three companies collecting fees and a walk into a coin shop involves none.
You can absolutely own physical gold without a gold IRA. You walk in, you pay, you leave with it. No custodian, no depository, no annual statement, no forms.
It is the oldest transaction in human commerce and it has not become complicated.
What you give up is a tax shelter. What you get back is the thing itself, in your hand, which is the entire reason most people wanted gold in the first place.
Let's go through the real trade.