IRA purchase and resale

[Joshua Welch]

Hey there guys, I have a question I'm trying to do some research on but I thought I'd post the question here and see if there are any experts who might have some answers. 

I've been talking with a friend and he has been advised to purchase a rental property with his IRA. I'm a real estate professional and I've been just looking over the deal with him. His idea is to purchase the property with his IRA for now and then resell it to himself at a later date when he moves some other money around so he can get the cash instead of tossing the proceeds into his IRA. I'm not sure he can do that though, and I've been trying to do some internet research on it. He is trying to reach out to his IRA people but it takes a good while to hear back from them unfortunately.

So I guess the question is are you allowed to sell an investment property that your IRA owns to yourself?

He has some other properties and as long as things go well he'll be able to cash out on them in the next couple years and use those funds to purchase the IRA property. This is basically a way to make sure he can jump on this deal now and who knows he may decide to keep it in the IRA and use the funds to buy something else in a couple years if another good property is available then.