GoldStar Trust Company is a Texas-based custodian for self-directed IRAs, handling accounts that hold precious metals, church bonds, real estate, private equity, and other alternative assets that traditional brokerages won’t touch.
The company was founded in 1989 as Colonial Trust Company, changed hands and names in 2004, and now operates as a trust subsidiary of Centennial Bank.
It manages more than $4.5 billion in assets across over 60,000 client accounts. This review covers the company’s history, services, fee structure, and reputation, along with current market data relevant to anyone considering a precious metals IRA in 2026.
Key Takeaways
- GoldStar Trust custodies over $4.5 billion in assets for 60,000+ clients and specializes in precious metals, church bonds, and other non-traditional IRA assets.
- Fees follow a published schedule but vary by asset type, with annual costs ranging from roughly $75 to $275 depending on account size and holdings.
- Customer ratings differ sharply by platform: Trustpilot scores land around 4.2 to 4.6 out of 5, while Yelp reviewers rate the company closer to 1.7.
Company Background
The company didn’t start as GoldStar. It began in Phoenix, Arizona in 1989 under the name Colonial Trust Company, spun off from Church Loans and Investment Trust to serve a specific niche: custodial work for church bond offerings and other assets that fell outside standard IRA custody. Colonial built a reputation in that narrow space through the 1990s and early 2000s.
In 2004, Happy State Bank, a Texas Panhandle bank founded in 1908, acquired Colonial Trust and renamed it GoldStar Trust Company. Two years later, in 2006, Happy State Bank bought American Church Trust and folded its operations into GoldStar, consolidating everything in Amarillo, Texas. That merger expanded GoldStar’s reach into precious metals, structured settlements, and additional alternative assets like Perth Mint certificates.
GoldStar operated out of Canyon, Texas for years before relocating in November 2024 to downtown Amarillo, inside the Happy State Bank building at 701 S Taylor Street. Today the company sits under Centennial Bank, part of Home BancShares, following a later ownership change. Jeff Kelley has served as president since January 2020 and has worked in the IRA trust industry since 2004.
What GoldStar Trust Actually Does
GoldStar acts as custodian, trustee, or escrow/paying agent, not as a broker or investment advisor. It doesn’t tell clients what to buy. It holds and administers the assets clients already decided on, and it handles the IRS paperwork that comes with self-directed retirement accounts. The company serves as trustee and paying agent for church and municipal bond issuers in 38 states, a niche few competitors touch.
Assets GoldStar will custody in a self-directed IRA include:
- Gold, silver, platinum, and palladium bullion
- Church bonds and church financing instruments
- Real estate held directly or through an LLC or LP
- Privately held stock and LLC interests
- Publicly traded stocks and mutual funds
- Swiss annuities
- Perth Mint certificates
- Equity crowdfunding notes and shares
One restriction worth noting: GoldStar does not permit single-member LLCs, sometimes called “checkbook IRAs,” for real estate investments. Some competitors allow this structure, so investors who specifically want checkbook control should look elsewhere.
Fee Structure
GoldStar publishes its fee schedule on its website rather than requiring a phone call to get pricing, which several reviewers point to as a plus. The structure is not flat, though. Costs shift depending on the asset class and, for some account types, the fair market value of the holdings.
| Fee Type | Typical Cost |
|---|---|
| Account setup | $50 one-time |
| Annual maintenance, standard SDIRA | $150 |
| Annual maintenance, precious metals | $75 to $150 |
| Annual maintenance, church bonds | $75 |
| Depository storage, commingled | $100/year |
| Depository storage, segregated | $150/year |
| Transaction fee | $25 to $100 per trade |
| Wire transfer | $50 |
| Account termination | $150 |
| Roth conversion | $75 |
| Paper statement | $25/year |
Real estate accounts carry their own schedule: a $50 setup fee, then $200 to $300 a year in maintenance depending on property value, plus a $100 fee on purchase or sale. Precious metals accounts under $100,000 in value cap annual maintenance around $275, and distributions of physical metal add a shipping charge plus a flat handling fee.
The sliding scale matters most for gold and silver holders. As bullion appreciates, the account’s fair market value climbs, and so does the maintenance fee tier. An investor holding $25,000 in gold might pay close to the minimum fee, but if that gold’s value grows past $100,000, the annual fee moves toward the higher end of the schedule. Flat-fee custodians in the space don’t do this. Whether that structure costs more or less than a flat-fee competitor depends entirely on account size and how much the metals appreciate.
Customer Reviews and Ratings
Review scores for GoldStar vary a lot depending on where you look, and the gap is wide enough to matter.
| Platform | Approximate Rating | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Trustpilot | 4.2 to 4.6 out of 5 | Based on 600 to 800+ reviews; rating has fluctuated across 2025 and 2026 |
| Better Business Bureau | A+ to A- | Not accredited with the BBB |
| Yelp | Around 1.7 out of 5 | Based on roughly 64 reviews |
| Around 2.2 out of 5 | Based on roughly 75 reviews |
Positive Trustpilot reviews tend to mention specific staff members by name, describe transfers from other custodians going through without major issues, and note that representatives walked clients through paperwork step by step. Negative reviews, concentrated more heavily on Yelp and Google, focus on distribution delays, difficulty reaching a decision-maker by phone, and fee increases that caught long-term account holders off guard.
GoldStar and its parent bank have logged 21 complaints with the BBB over the past three years, with three closed in the most recent 12-month period. Common complaint themes include paperwork errors, slow distribution processing, and disputes over fee changes. GoldStar’s public responses to Trustpilot complaints generally acknowledge the frustration and state that management will follow up directly, though the resolution outcome isn’t always visible in the public review thread.
Where GoldStar Fits in the 2026 Precious Metals Market
Gold has had an unusual run. As of early July 2026, spot gold traded above $4,150 per ounce, up roughly 24 percent from the same point a year earlier, according to Trading Economics data. Prices touched a record high near $5,600 in January 2026 before pulling back. The World Gold Council reported central banks added a net 41 metric tons to reserves in May 2026 alone, part of a longer buying trend that has kept institutional demand for bullion elevated.
That price movement has a direct, practical effect on anyone holding metals through a GoldStar account. Since annual maintenance fees for precious metals IRAs scale with fair market value, a run-up like the one gold has seen over the past year pushes accounts into higher fee tiers faster than in a flat or declining market. An account that sat comfortably in the $75 tier at the start of 2025 may have crossed into $150 or higher territory by mid-2026 purely from price appreciation, without the client adding a single ounce.
For comparison, JPMorgan’s research desk projected gold could reach $4,300 by the third quarter of 2026 and $4,500 by year’s end, according to reporting from Trading Economics. If that forecast holds, sliding-scale custodians like GoldStar will see a larger share of their precious metals accounts migrate into upper fee brackets over the coming two quarters. Investors weighing GoldStar against a flat-fee competitor should run the math against where gold is likely headed, not just where it sits today.
Strengths and Drawbacks
GoldStar’s strengths center on specialization and longevity. Few custodians in the country handle church bond trusteeship at scale, and GoldStar’s three-plus decades in that niche give it institutional knowledge that newer entrants lack. The published fee schedule removes guesswork before opening an account. Assets under custody have grown from roughly $2 billion a decade ago to over $4.5 billion today, which suggests the business has kept pace with client growth rather than stagnating.
The drawbacks show up mostly in service speed and fee predictability. Multiple reviewers describe distribution requests taking weeks longer than initially quoted. The sliding-scale fee model on precious metals accounts can surprise clients who didn’t model out how rising gold prices would affect their annual bill. And the rating gap between Trustpilot and Yelp/Google suggests customer experience is inconsistent rather than uniformly strong or weak.
Conclusion
GoldStar Trust Company offers real specialization in church bonds, precious metals, and other alternative IRA assets, backed by over three decades in the business and a transparent published fee schedule. Anyone considering it should compare the sliding-scale fee structure against flat-fee competitors based on their expected account growth, and should go in with realistic expectations about distribution processing times.