If your

retirement savings took a hit that they haven’t yet been able to recover from after the recession, you are like the many Americans now facing losses in your nest egg. Instead of watching your money stay stagnant or decrease rather than grow, you should explore alternative ways to save. The Equifax Finance Blog shares some insightful ideas for making your retirement savings grow in the new article, “

Using Retirement Money for Real Estate Investments.”

You can create a real estate driven self-directed IRA so long as you use your retirement savings on the real estate purchase and improvement, and the profit goes back into the IRA. This avoids capital gains tax on the amount you earn until you take the money out of the IRA much later down the road.

Adding

real estate is a great day to diversify your retirement portfolio and protect against the volatility of the stock market. With prices low from the burst housing bubble, investors can snap up quality properties for pennies on the dollar. With enough patience, real estate purchases will ripen as the market recovers. If you don’t have the time or patience for that, you can take the home and flip it: renovate at low cost and put it back on the market at an aggressive price to sell it quickly. As long as you put the proceeds back in your IRA, you can quickly grow your retirement fund.

Of course, there are risks to putting your money into real estate. For more on that, check out the full article on the Equifax Finance Blog, along with great personal financial advice about retirement, credit and more.