Introduction to Checkbook Control
May 31, 2019

Since the concept of individual retirement accounts (IRAs) was introduced in 1974, there’s been a lot of misunderstanding about how they work and what types of investments are eligible to be held.
From a strictly legal perspective, there are very few things that an IRA owner is prohibited from investing in with their retirement account. In fact, the IRS code only identifies life insurance and collectibles as prohibited investments. However, because such accounts must be held by third party custodians, it didn’t take long for banks and stock brokerage companies to realize that if they would act as the custodian, they could effectively limit what was offered through such accounts to only those investments which generated profits for them. In fact, custodial services are often offered by such firms for free or for fees so small that they don’t even cover the related administrative costs.
Continue reading…