There have been discussion about the problems with getting loans to buy rental property.

Conventional mortgage are limited to 4 per person.

A few years ago Blue mentioned that possibility of buying rental properties under an IRA. And had a link to someone that did that. At the time it was very sketchy.

And the rules for the fiducary resonsibility of the trustee make it difficult.

Don’t know if the rules have changed or not, but apparently the concept is now mainstream.

Here is one bank that will lend upto 70% on investment property under an IRA. As the IRA is a seperate endity these loand don’t count against you nor are they based on your credit score.

But they do need things like rent rolls or signed leases to show tha tthe property can pay the loan.

http://www.iralending.com/

That link also has links for trustees and manage companies that are needed to do this.

Note – the tax advantage of this is probably not as good as regular investment propery if this is done under a convential IRA (or SEP or similar). MOST LIKEly, like with stocks, all moeny that comes out would be treated as ordinary income and the capital gains advantage would be lost.

Under a ROTH everything that comes out (after the require age and 5 years) is tax free. So it probably better than directly owning it. Don’t know if it exscapes the recapture taxes or not.

Note- I have no idea how much control you would have under this kind of plan or if it has all handled by a management company. IE who does the maintance and who selects the renters.

Note – you don’t have to take out a loan. AFAIK you can directly purchase the property using the same technicques.

But also note that that will concentrate you retire plan in one type of investment so it should be done with care and in small amounts.

I don’t know more than I what I posted and 1/2 of what I posted is my guess.

I heard about this on a local radio show by a CPA.

I found that site (and many other links) by googling – self direct ira rental realestate –