A Self Directed Individual Retirement Arrangement means IRA that requires the account owner to make investment decisions and investments on behalf of the retirement plan and is a special purpose limited liability company. There are many benefits for this. For example, you can hold real estate or other non-traditional investments in an IRA with checkbook control. Indirect investments via the ICO can be your only choice as very few IRA custodians permit direct ownership of real estate. You have direct control over ICO assets and custodian involvement is eliminated. As you control everything, including ICO transactions, the custodian for the self directed IRA can be paid flat fee which is under $200 per year.