1. The self-directed IRA

First secret is something called the self-directed IRA. If you’ve never heard of it, it’s not surprising. Ninety-eight percent of the approximately $20 trillion that Americans have in retirement money are in regular non-self-directed accounts. Their money may be at any of the big brokerages (e.g. Schwab, Fidelity, eTrade, TD Ameritrade) where they can buy and sell stocks, bonds and mutual funds you want. But they can’t go off Wall Street. Enter a self-directed plan (which be established as an IRA or a 401k). “Self-directed” in the truest sense means you can take your retirement money off Wall Street and direct into, say, real estate. That’s the classic usage of a self-directed plan. For almost two decades now, people with self-directed plans have been also investing into “alternative assets” such as precious metals, tax liens, notes, private companies, hedge funds, IPOs. The IRS only forbids collectibles and life insurance. The newest and most explosive asset people have been using their self-directed plans is cryptocurrency, including bitcoin, ether, as well as all the altcoins. That’s the first secret. If you know about self-directed IRAs, great. If you don’t, you can get yourself up to speed in an hour or two with a book I’ve written called The Ultimate Self-Directed IRA (available on Amazon).