I was wondering if someone could please shed some light on what the criteria are to show to the IRA that this vacation was indeed for business purposes.

Roth accounts allow you to hedge against higher taxes in the future (more likely than not, in my opinion), and RE investment can help save taxes now, while still providing income now and into the future.RE is part of my retirement plan, but so are IRAs and 401Ks.As a side note, I had a professor during my freshman year of college (a financial planner) who recommended we save for retirement as if Social Security was not going to be there for us. 

What is the difference between the self-directed IRA and solo IRA?

I live in Henderson Nv and have an IRA I inherited from my deceased mother, and would like to form a checkbook control self directed IRA/LLC for the purposes of purchasing an absentee owned business and have chosen Preferred Trust Company in Nevada for my custodial account.

We even get the retirement saving tax credit for funding IRAs and a 401k.  

Ditto to Nick's comment.I use K&E and KKOS -- based primarily out of Utah -- for both my personal and business filings, since they offer both tax attorney and CPA services, they are investors themselves, and wrote the book on self-directing IRAs that the IRS uses to train its new agents (by Mat Sorrenson -- the "S" in "KKOS").In short, Mark Kohler's team on either side are worth checking out (they post videos regarding tax tips on YouTube as well).I hope that helps. :]

I some unrelated arenas (like SD IRAs) there are rules against doing business with an immediate family member. 

Maybe he can max his IRA's etc.

@John Underwood Once you create a Self Directed IRA and select a property, you can manage the property in one of three ways.Manage through a Self Directed IRA Custodian - The IRA custodian is involved in each transaction under this property management structure.

Sold a condo in south Denver and used those proceeds along with $2,000 borrowed from my Roth IRA account.