Invest in the Best Long-Term Investment with Your Self-Directed Retirement Plan

How to invest your 401k or IRA in real estate, voted best long-term investment two years in a row

America has spoken: real estate is now confirmed as America’s favorite long-term investment. According to Gallup, a survey shows that 31% of Americans choose real estate as the best option. The second best choice is stocks and mutual funds (25%), and the third is gold (19%).

Real estate has increasingly been recognized as one of the best investments for a long-term portfolio. The result is not surprising. With a wide range of investment assets, including properties, raw land, and mortgage notes, real estate offers higher returns and lower risk. Many investors consider real estate a safer investment than stocks, because it is often secure with a property. The tangible asset also acts as a safeguard against inflation.

Although most investors have chosen real estate as their best option for long term investments, this option is not yet available to all investors when it comes to retirement planning. Traditional retirement plan, such as 401(k)’s for example, are often held by banks and trust companies. These entities often offer only stocks, mutual funds, and bonds to their 401(k) clients.

Sense Financial, a provider of self-directed retirement plans, now presents a solution to this gap in retirement planning. With a self-directed retirement plan, such as a Solo 401k, or a self-directed IRA LLC, plan holders have the options of investing in real estate, among other non-traditional assets.

With an IRA LLC, for example, the plan custodian takes a passive role, where he sets up a special purpose LLC and invests the entire IRA fund in this LLC. The plan participant will then be named as the manager of the LLC, and gain total control over the retirement funds.

A Solo 401k plan, on the other hand, is allowed by the IRS to operate without any third-party custodian. In this structure, the plan holders are automatically the sole decision maker. Many investors take this opportunity to direct their Solo 401k funds to alternative investments, such as rental properties or mortgage notes. These investments offer passive income over a long period of time, which fits with the goals of a retirement plan.

Sense Financial is California's leading provider of retirement accounts with "Checkbook Control": the Solo 401k and the Checkbook IRA. Over the years, they have assisted hundreds of clients to obtain checkbook control over their retirement accounts while providing them with the ability to invest in virtually any investment class, including real estate, private lending, mortgage notes and much more without the need for custodian approval.

To learn more about Solo 401k, please visit sensefinancial.com.