Quick answers:
- Which accounts can move into a gold IRA?
- Can you roll over a workplace plan while still working?
- What should a gold IRA lead screen ask?
- Does a balance threshold still matter?
Most precious metals lead vendors describe their screen in adjectives. One publishes it as a list. That list is a good screen with one hole in it, and the hole decides whether you ever collect.
The one screen on page one published in full
Scorpio Digital publishes its gold IRA filter on its own lead generation page for gold IRA companies. A lead has to be a “U.S. resident, age 55 or older,” be “actively interested in a Gold IRA rollover or new precious metals account,” clear a “minimum retirement savings threshold that matches your target account size,” have an “existing IRA, 401(k), or eligible retirement account to roll over,” supply a “valid phone number and consent to be contacted,” and be “no duplicate or recycled data.”
Publishing that puts them ahead of most of the category. Consent and deduplication are real filters that cost a vendor volume.
Now read the list by what each item measures. Five of the six describe a person: where they live, how old they are, what they say they want, whether the phone works, whether you have seen them before. Exactly one describes the money, and it describes the size of it.
The account question asks whether an account exists. That is a test of possession, not of availability. And “eligible” carries the whole weight of that sentence without a definition anywhere on the page, or on any other page on page one.
Age 55 and a balance threshold point at the same blind spot
Start with where the money is. According to the Investment Company Institute’s Quarterly Retirement Market Data for the first quarter of 2026, IRAs held $18.2 trillion in assets at the end of that quarter. According to that same ICI release, Americans held $13.8 trillion in all employer-based defined contribution plans on 31 March 2026. Of that, again according to ICI, $9.9 trillion was held in 401(k) plans. All three are national asset totals across US households, not per-account balances and not rollover volume.
Note which pool is bigger. On those figures the IRA pool is the larger of the two, and IRA money is generally money a prospect can already direct. The trillions sitting in 401(k) plans are the pool where somebody else holds the gate. A screen that asks only whether an account exists cannot tell those two apart.
The IRS states the constraint in one sentence on its rollovers of retirement plan and IRA distributions page: “Of course, to get a distribution from a retirement plan, you have to meet the plan’s conditions for a distribution, such as termination of employment.” The plan document decides. Not the prospect, not you, and not the size of the balance.
Put the age filter next to that. A floor of 55 with no upper bound and no employment question does not separate a retiree from someone a decade away from retiring. If anything it selects toward people still in the workforce. A still-working prospect is precisely the one whose balance may sit behind a plan gate. The filter meant to find rollover-ready money is not aimed squarely at it.
The balance threshold has the same shape. “Retirement savings” is a household number that aggregates accounts your prospect can move with accounts they cannot. A prospect can clear the threshold and still have nothing available this quarter.
Which accounts can actually move, and what stops each one
The middle two columns below come from the IRS rollover chart, read on 13 August 2026, except where a cell says the chart does not cover that account. The rows and the last column are ours. The chart maps what the tax rules permit; the last column is what still stops the money, or blocks it outright, after the rules say yes.
| Account the prospect names | Rolls into a traditional IRA? | What the IRS chart shows | What still stops it, or blocks it outright |
|---|---|---|---|
| Traditional IRA | Yes | Yes, footnoted to one rollover in any 12-month period | A prior rollover inside the same 12-month window |
| SEP-IRA | Yes | Yes, under the same 12-month footnote | The same 12-month window |
| Former employer’s 401(k) or other qualified plan | Yes | Yes, and the chart names profit-sharing, 401(k), money purchase and defined benefit plans as qualified plans | Usually nothing structural, which is why this is the account you want |
| Current employer’s 401(k) | The chart does not decide this | The plan type is rollable, but the chart says nothing about whether a distribution is available | The plan’s own conditions, per the IRS rollovers page |
| 403(b), pre-tax | Yes | Yes | The same availability question as any employer plan |
| Governmental 457(b) | Yes | Yes | The same availability question as any employer plan |
| SIMPLE IRA | Yes, after two years | Yes, marked “after two years” | The two-year period, which the published screen above never asks about |
| Thrift Savings Plan, still serving | Sometimes | Not listed separately on the chart | The TSP’s own in-service rules, which are narrow and defined |
| Roth IRA | No | A Roth IRA rolls only to another Roth IRA | It cannot fund a traditional self-directed IRA at all |
| Designated Roth account in a 401(k), 403(b) or 457(b) | No | It rolls only to a Roth IRA or another designated Roth account | The same wall as a Roth IRA |
Read the fourth row again. It is the only row the chart cannot answer, and it covers the largest pool of employer-plan money. The chart tells you a 401(k) is a rollable plan type. Whether this 401(k) will release this balance is answered only by the plan document, and the prospect usually does not know either. That is why it has to be asked.
Two rows are hard walls rather than delays. A Roth IRA and a designated Roth account both route only to a Roth IRA. If your product is a traditional self-directed IRA, a prospect whose balance is entirely Roth is not a slow lead. They are the wrong lead, and no follow-up cadence fixes it.
One large plan shows what in-service access looks like when it is spelled out. According to the Thrift Savings Plan’s in-service withdrawal page, there are two types of in-service withdrawal for active federal workers and uniformed services members: financial hardship and age-59 ½. That same TSP page says the tax withheld applies “unless you’re able to roll it over to an IRA or an eligible employer plan.” Those rules bind the TSP and nothing else. They are worth reading anyway, because they show the shape of the question: a route that exists, on terms the plan sets, for people past a specific age.
The screening script to send your vendor
Here is the account section as it should be asked, in order. Send it to a vendor and ask which they already capture and which they will add.
- “Do you have retirement savings in an IRA, a 401(k), or another workplace plan?” The question vendors already ask. Keep it as the opener, not the qualifier.
- “Is that money with a company you currently work for, or one you used to work for?” The missing question. A former employer’s plan is the clean case; a current employer’s plan goes to a different queue with a longer clock.
- “Roughly how much is in that specific account?” Not household retirement savings. The account named in question two.
- “Is any of it a Roth account?” A Roth balance routes to a Roth IRA and nowhere else.
- “Is it a SIMPLE IRA, and if so, when did you first contribute?” A prospect eleven months in is a calendar entry, not a sale.
- “Are you still working there, and does the plan allow a withdrawal while employed?” Most people will not know. The answer you want is whether they will call their plan administrator and find out.
What the account question does not settle
Account type predicts whether money can move. It does not predict whether someone will move it. Intent, timing, trust and patience with a custodian’s paperwork are all separate, and none of them appear in a routing table. A screen built only on account type would be as narrow as one built only on balance.
One more distinction is worth getting right, because page one makes it easy to blur. The guide-format incumbent at myairtime.net sorts leads into tiers in its gold investor lead taxonomy, and its premium tier is accredited investors, described there as people who “meet specific SEC-compliant financial benchmarks (usually a $1M net worth excluding their primary residence or $200K+ annual income)” with “access to exclusive private placements and mining funds that aren’t available to the general public.”
That placement is correct, and it is worth saying so plainly. According to the SEC’s investor bulletin on accredited investors, an individual qualifies with “net worth over $1 million, either alone or together with a spouse or spousal equivalent (excluding the value of the person’s primary residence)” or “earned income that exceeded $200,000 (or $300,000 together with a spouse or spousal equivalent) in each of the prior two years.” That same bulletin describes the standard gating unregistered offerings from private issuers such as hedge funds and venture capital funds. Private placements and mining funds are exactly that.
The trap is on your side of the page, not theirs. Accreditation sits in a taxonomy whose other tiers include the people who buy gold IRAs, and the bar is easy to carry across. Do not carry it. Nothing in the accredited standard bears on whether someone may open a self-directed IRA or move a rollover into one, and applying it to gold IRA buyers would cut the addressable market for a reason that belongs to a different product.
Two more numbers on that page need their labels stated. According to that same guide, its qualified-investor benchmark describes individuals who “have invested or inquired to invest a minimum of $10,000 in gold or silver within the last 12 months,” which is a list vendor’s definition of a qualified gold investor, not a dealer’s economic threshold. And according to that guide, “the average Gold IRA rollover ranges from $25,000 to $250,000+,” which is a range for rollover size, not a lead price and not household savings.
Once the account question is answered, the price conversation gets easier, and that is where our funded rollover economics guide picks up. The aged versus real time comparison makes the companion point that demographic selects describe a person while the money is decided by an account. For what each product costs, see gold investor lead cost by product or the gold IRA leads overview.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which accounts can move into a gold IRA?
A traditional IRA, a SEP-IRA, a 403(b), a governmental 457(b), a former employer’s 401(k) and a SIMPLE IRA after two years all roll into a traditional IRA on the IRS rollover chart. A Roth IRA and a designated Roth account route only to a Roth IRA. A current employer’s 401(k) depends on the plan’s own conditions rather than on the chart.
Can you roll over a workplace plan while still working?
Sometimes, and the plan decides. The IRS puts it plainly: to get a distribution from a retirement plan you have to meet the plan’s conditions for a distribution, such as termination of employment. This is a question for the plan administrator rather than an assumption.
What should a gold IRA lead screen ask?
Whether an account exists, then whether it is with a current or former employer, then the balance in that specific account rather than household savings, then whether any of it is Roth, then whether it is a SIMPLE IRA. The second question is the one most published screens omit.
Does a balance threshold still matter?
Yes, but as a second filter rather than a first. A household savings threshold aggregates money that can move with money that cannot. Ask which account holds the balance first, then how much is in it.
Buying gold IRA leads that can actually transact
The cheapest improvement to a gold IRA lead buy is not a better price. It is one more question on the intake form, asked before the balance question rather than after it.
Send the six questions above to your vendor and see which come back as “we can add that.” Then run question two against the leads you have already paid for. For a second read on what your current screen is selecting for, talk to us about lead generation.
