We are an independent research team that helps retirement savers compare gold IRA companies on the things that actually matter: real fees, the dealer markup over spot, storage, custody, and how a company treats you after you fund the account. We do not sell metals. We score them.
The gold IRA market is loud, and most of the noise is sales copy. Investors hear about "free silver," urgency, and limited-mintage coins long before anyone explains the one number that decides whether a gold IRA is a fair deal: the premium a dealer charges over the live spot price. Gold IRA Consulting was built to close that gap. We read the fine print, request the kits, sit through the calls, and translate what we find into plain rankings and guides that a person planning their retirement can actually use.
We are reader-first by design. Every page is meant to help you make a calmer, better-informed decision, including the decision to not open a gold IRA when it is the wrong fit. If a small balance, a short time horizon, or a high-premium coin pitch makes the math work against you, we say so. You can start with our scored best gold IRA companies rankings, but the goal of this page is simpler: to show you who is behind that research and the standards we hold it to.
Three commitments shape everything we publish. They are the reason you can trust a ranking on this site over a paid placement somewhere else.
A small team, named on every byline. One analyst does the digging and writes; one CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER reviews the work for accuracy and balance before it goes live.
Marcus has spent close to a decade studying self-directed retirement accounts and the precious-metals dealers that serve them. He built Gold IRA Consulting's fee-verification process, requesting investor kits, taking the sales calls, and logging the quoted spreads over spot that most published rankings never capture. His focus is the gap between a company's headline pricing and what an investor actually pays at the counter. Marcus writes the rankings, reviews, and guides on this site.
Dana is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER who reviews Gold IRA Consulting's money pages for accuracy and balance before they publish. Her job is to challenge anything that reads like a sales pitch, confirm that the tax treatment and rollover mechanics line up with current IRS guidance, and make sure every page is honest about who a gold IRA is wrong for. Nothing on Gold IRA Consulting carries her review unless the math and the rules check out.
Gold IRA Consulting is reader-supported. The research is free to you because some of the companies we cover run affiliate programs, and when you open an account through one of our links (marked rel="sponsored") the provider may pay us a commission at no extra cost to you. That is the entire business model, and we would rather state it plainly than bury it.
Here is the firewall: commissions never influence the rankings. Scores come from the same weighted rubric (fees and pricing transparency 30%, custody and storage 25%, service and buyback 25%, reputation 20%) applied to every provider, whether or not they have an affiliate relationship with us. A company with no program can outrank one that pays, and a paying company can sit near the bottom if the numbers say so. We explain exactly how the money side stays separate from the editorial side in our editorial policy.
We are a research and comparison site, not a dealer, custodian, or registered investment adviser. We do not sell metals, hold your account, or know your personal situation, so nothing here is individualized financial, tax, or legal advice. Treat Gold IRA Consulting as a well-sourced starting point, then confirm any decision with a licensed professional. For the underlying rules, we always point you back to the primary sources rather than ask you to trust a summary.
Found an error, a stale fee, or a company that changed its terms? Tell us. Accuracy on a retirement topic depends on readers flagging what we miss, and we update pages when the facts move. Reach the editorial team at hello@goldiraconsulting.com.
We get paid by affiliate links, never by rankings. The score a company earns is the score it gets, whether it pays us or not.
Yes. Gold IRA Consulting is not owned by, and does not operate, any gold IRA company, custodian, or depository. We do not sell metals and we do not manage accounts. Our rankings are decided by a fixed scoring rubric applied the same way to every provider, and a company cannot pay to move up the list. The affiliate commissions that fund the site are disclosed and kept entirely separate from how we score.
We are reader-supported through affiliate partnerships. When you open an account through one of our links (marked rel="sponsored"), the partner company may pay us a commission at no extra cost to you. That revenue keeps the research free, but it never changes a company's score or position. The same rubric, weighted on fees, custody, service, and reputation, decides the rankings whether or not a company has an affiliate relationship with us.
Every ranking, review, and guide is written by Marcus Halloran, our Precious Metals IRA Analyst, and reviewed for accuracy by Dana Reyes, a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER. Marcus handles the provider research and fee verification, while Dana confirms that the tax rules, rollover mechanics, and risk warnings are correct and balanced before anything publishes.
No. We are a research and comparison site, not a dealer, custodian, or registered investment adviser. Nothing on Gold IRA Consulting is personalized financial, tax, or legal advice. We cite primary sources such as IRS Publication 590-A and 590-B so you can verify the rules yourself, and we recommend confirming any decision with a licensed advisor who knows your situation.
We request each provider's investor kit, review published fee schedules where they exist, and record quoted pricing from direct conversations, then stamp every figure with the date we confirmed it (currently fees verified Jun 2026). Because promotions and pricing change often, and because the dealer markup over spot is rarely printed, we tell readers to confirm current numbers directly with the company before funding an account.
Tax treatment, contribution and distribution rules we rely on: IRS Publication 590-A (contributions to IRAs) and IRS Publication 590-B (distributions from IRAs).
Permitted metals and the collectibles standard for IRAs: Internal Revenue Code section 408(m)(3), which sets the bullion and coin requirements an IRA may hold.
Investor-protection and fraud guidance we reference: the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Office of Investor Education and Advocacy, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) consumer guidance on investing in bullion and coins, and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) customer advisories on precious-metals schemes.
Provider fees and minimums reflect our independent dataset, fees verified Jun 2026. Pricing and promotions change; confirm current terms directly with each company.
Our standards only matter if the rankings reflect them. Explore the 2026 list, scored on verified fees, custody, service, and reputation, or request a free investor kit to see one provider's exact pricing for yourself.