The "gold IRA expert" who answers a company's phone line is almost always a salesperson paid on what you buy. That can still be a useful conversation. Here is how a free gold IRA consultation works, a script for the call, how to check the person and the firm, and when you need a fee-only fiduciary instead.
Despite the word "Consulting" in our name, Gold IRA Consulting is an independent research publisher. We do not offer consultations, phone calls or personal advice, we do not sell metals, and we are not a registered investment adviser. We earn affiliate commissions from some companies we cover, as explained on our about page. This guide is meant to help you get the most out of the conversations you have with people who do offer them.
Call any of the large gold IRA dealers and you will be routed to someone with a title like specialist, account executive, IRA specialist or senior advisor. Birch Gold Group's site invites you to "Speak With a Specialist"; American Hartford Gold's repeats the same call to action. These people often know the paperwork well. Their job, though, is to open accounts and sell metal.
You do not have to guess at that. The companies say so in their own fine print. Goldco's website states: "Even though Goldco and its representatives are precious metals specialists, we are not licensed financial advisors and do not give financial advice." American Hartford Gold's states that it "does not provide investment, legal, retirement planning, or tax advice." Those are honest disclosures, and they tell you what the person on the phone is not.
Compensation in this industry is built around sales. A job listing for a senior account executive at Allegiance Gold, for example, advertises a pay range of $45,000 to $250,000 with commission pay and bonus pay, and describes junior reps who qualify leads and "set up the live transfer" to the closer. The CFTC's advisory 10 Things to Ask Before Buying Physical Gold, Silver, or Other Metals warns that some metals sellers are "boiler-room telemarketers trained, rehearsed, and incentivized to separate customers from their money," and that a prospect may be handed off to a "lead trader" or special expert. Not every firm works that way, but the incentive is the same everywhere: the rep earns more when you buy more, and usually more on high-premium products.
The custodian that holds your gold IRA is a separate company and does not advise you either. GoldStar Trust's fee schedule says plainly that it "will not exercise any investment discretion" and that you agree it "is not a fiduciary" for your IRA. The SEC and NASAA investor alert on self-directed IRAs adds that fraudsters "often falsely claim or imply that self-directed IRA custodians investigate and validate any investment." They do not. The split between the three parties is explained in custodian vs dealer vs depository.
| WHO | PAID BY | DUTY TO YOU | GOOD FOR | HOW TO VERIFY |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Company gold IRA specialist | The dealer, largely through sales pay | No fiduciary duty; firms disclaim giving advice | Product details, pricing, paperwork, timelines | BBB and state AG complaint records; written quote |
| Fee-only fiduciary adviser | You, by flat, hourly or asset-based fee | Fiduciary: act in your best interest | Whether gold fits, how much, which account | SEC IAPD, NAPFA directory, CFP Board lookup |
| Broker or commission adviser | Commissions on products sold | Varies by role and registration | Securities-based options such as gold funds | FINRA BrokerCheck |
| CPA or enrolled agent | You, by fee | Professional standards for tax work | Rollover tax effects, RMDs, Roth conversions | Your state board of accountancy |
| IRA custodian | Account fees | Not a fiduciary for your choices | Holding the account, reporting, processing | Your account documents |
A free consultation is free in the sense that you pay nothing for the call. The company pays for it out of the margin on what you buy, which is why it costs nothing to book and why the conversation will steer toward a purchase. Used deliberately, it is still the fastest way to get a firm's real prices. A sensible way to run it:
Read these in order. The answers to the first five tell you most of what you need. A longer version with the deflections to listen for is in our list of questions to ask a gold IRA company.
Good answers are specific and arrive in writing. Watch for a question answered with a story, a percentage replaced by "it depends", or a pivot from bullion to a "special" coin. Those are the moments the conversation stopped being a consultation and became a close. The guide to gold IRA markups explains what reasonable spreads look like in a written quote.
Gold IRA due diligence has two halves: the person and the firm. Many metals sales reps hold no securities or investment adviser registration, so they may not appear in the databases below. That alone is not proof of a problem, but anyone who calls themselves a financial advisor, investment adviser or fiduciary should be findable. Checks worth running, all free:
The CFTC's precious metal frauds page explains why this matters: "unscrupulous dealers pose as 'IRA experts' or act as illegal investment advisors to convince customers to rollover their retirement savings into Self-Directed IRAs." It also describes a complaint in which a customer paid nearly $150,000 in commissions and fees on a $300,000 rollover.
A specialist can tell you what a product costs. Only someone without a product to sell can tell you whether you should buy it. Consider paying for independent advice when:
Two terms are worth knowing. NAPFA, the National Association of Personal Financial Advisors, defines fee-only planners as advisers "compensated directly by their clients for advice, plan implementation and for the ongoing management of assets," and contrasts its fiduciary standard with the suitability standard used by commission-based advisers. The CFP Board's Code of Ethics and Standards of Conduct says that "at all times when providing Financial Advice to a Client, a CFP professional must act as a fiduciary." For tax questions, a CPA or enrolled agent is the right professional; a metals company cannot give tax advice, as its own disclaimers say.
Be ready for an honest fiduciary to be skeptical about physical metal in an IRA. That skepticism is worth hearing even if you go ahead. If you do, they can help you size the position and plan RMDs around it.
The best consultations, paid or free, start with your own numbers. Before a call, write down your total investable assets, the share you would consider putting in metal and the resulting dollar figure, when you expect to start withdrawals, the account you would fund it from, and what you would do if gold fell 30 percent in the first year. If you cannot answer the last one calmly, the allocation is probably too big. Then compare the running costs in our gold IRA fees breakdown against the size of that slice. Walking in with those answers turns a sales call into a fact-finding call.
Usually not. A gold IRA specialist or account executive works for a precious metals dealer and is typically paid through sales compensation such as commissions and bonuses. Major dealers say so in their own disclaimers: Goldco states its representatives are not licensed financial advisors and do not give financial advice, and American Hartford Gold states it does not provide investment, legal, retirement planning or tax advice.
You pay nothing for the call, but it is funded by the margin on what you buy, so the conversation is designed to lead to a purchase. It is still useful if you control it: compare two or three firms, say up front you will not buy on the call, ask for the price over spot and the buyback price, and request a written quote with all fees before you fund anything.
No. Anyone can open a self-directed IRA and buy approved metals through a dealer and custodian. Independent advice is worth paying for when the amount is a large share of your savings, when you are rolling over a pension or workplace plan, when RMDs or a Roth conversion are close, or when a salesperson is suggesting more than about 10 percent of your portfolio in metal.
Search the NAPFA Find an Advisor directory for fee-only members, confirm certification on the CFP Board's verification tool, and check the adviser and firm on the SEC's Investment Adviser Public Disclosure site and FINRA BrokerCheck. Ask whether they will act as a fiduciary in writing and exactly how they are paid. Many will do a one-off or hourly review if you only need a second opinion.
No. Despite the name, Gold IRA Consulting is an independent research publisher. We do not offer calls, consultations or personal financial advice, we do not sell metals, and we are not a registered investment adviser. We publish rankings, guides and fee research, and we earn affiliate commissions from some companies we cover, which we disclose on every page.
Check the firm's complaint history with the Better Business Bureau and your state attorney general, search CFTC enforcement releases for the company name, verify anyone calling themselves an adviser on FINRA BrokerCheck or the SEC IAPD site, confirm the custodian independently, and get a written quote showing products, price over spot, all fees and buyback terms. The CFTC warns that some dealers pose as IRA experts to win rollovers.
Our rankings score providers on fee transparency, custody, service and reputation, so you go into a consultation knowing what a fair quote looks like.