I have a 401(k), rollover IRA and a pre-1986 IRA, all at Fidelity. My rollover used to be managed by my former employer but when I was downsized, I moved the money and since my current employer uses Fidelity, I put it there. I totally lucked out because I moved my money into savings at Fidelity and had it in savings when the 2008 crash occurred, so I didn’t lose anything. I have a managed account for my rollover but I manage the other 2 myself. I’d rather pay less fees, but I toted it up and the time I would spend on managing the account and the transaction fees I would pay are balanced out by the personal attention. Fidelity has brick and mortar buildings and I have quarterly phone conferences and a yearly update with my advisor, with whom I have worked for 10 years now.
H has his money at Merrill and manages it himself, but he has less than 20% of what I have.
I have 2 defined benefit pensions and we will both get SS.
The rest of our retirement is in the three houses we own and the one we will inherit when MIL passes.
I have accounts at Fidelity and Schwab and my children have their Roth IRAs at Vanguard. I find Fidelity’s interface the easiest to understand, but that may only be because I have spent more time on Fidelity’s site. Schwab offers wonderfully detailed research, but I find it more difficult to navigate their site.
Vanguard is completely not intuitive. My son and I both sat and stared at his account page for ten minutes, attempting to figure out how to fund his Roth from an already established account relationship. He decided to close the account and move it to Fidelity.
I think Fidelity, Schwab & Vanguard all offer low or no fee funds these days. Fidelity’s MM account may pay a few more basis points than Schwab’s, but I don’t think you can go wrong with any of them, as long as you can work your way around their websites.
All of ours that isn’t still in the Megacorp 401k is at Vanguard. We’re DIYers. Actually, I am a DIYers, and Dadof JandL can’t be bothered with it and trusts me.
If I didn’t want to manage the investments I would use Vanguard Personal Advisory Service (PAS). It’s not really all that “personal”, definitely not warm and fuzzy, and all done online or by phone, you don’t get a person to meet with, and you might talk to a different person every time. That’s all fine, because the important part is that the investments they make and the fees they charge are better than what you would get anywhere else, IMO.
We are meeting with our broker soon so good thread. One thing we want to talk about are fees. Merril Lynch in a manged account etfs. 70%Stock to bonds. This year up 13% after fee’s.
We pay 1% for them to manage and we do meet with our guy at least once a year but now very interested in looking into Vanguard to save fee’s and if they still manage the account. We are primarily hands off and we are OK with that. We have our Roth Ira etc also. Interesting thread. Keep going… Lol…
We have most of our retirement accounts at Vanguard. We have enough there that we can talk to a financial advisor for free whenever we feel we need some advice.
For those who do it yourselves, how often do you “rebalance” your portfolio? Only after market corrections or on a quarterly basis or some other schedule? It’s the self-managed aspect that I find daunting.
@Knowsstuff , talking to a salesman (which is what your advisor is) about fees is a loser’s game. He is trained to sell you on why his service is worth the fees that he charges, he’s been doing it for years, he does it every day, and he’s good at it. Doesn’t mean he’s right, but it means it is a pointless discussion for you to have.
If your option without him is to put the money in a money market account because you are afraid to make a decision, or trying to pick stocks and time the market, then he is probably earning his fees because he’ll almost certainly do better for you than either of those options (although if the market crashes the money market fund would be better, and if you get really really lucky the stock picking would be better, so you never know).
If your option instead is to work with an advisor that does not charge high fees and that only invests in low-fee funds, then he is a drag on your earnings.
What’s rebalancing? I joke. Not very often. One to two times per year, if that. I’m not a market timer and I follow a buy and hold philosophy, for the most part. I do own index funds but my portfolio isn’t totally passive. I do own some individual securities and will occasionally jettison a dog when I think it appropriate or wake up from my stupor.
I will be honest with you. He has actually told us as much. He said he doesn’t make decisions really anymore and is basically a salesperson. He has been upfront about that. So maybe we are in a good place. They did lower our fee’s a few years back.
Maybe what we pay is worth it… I am just intrigued by what I am reading here. He has told us about other investment strategies also etc.
A good friend of mine over 30 years ago who invests other people’s money with a 2 million minimum (not us lol) told us to pick any mutual fund by any big name group. Put money into monthly. Don’t read the newspaper and don’t react to the market trends. Just keep putting money on for like 30 years or longer… Lol.
We pretty much have been doing that and it seems to be working out.
Our portfolio is pretty diverse also.
We are not extreme risk takers and have played around with some individual stocks like home depot 25 years ago… Walgreens as they were expanding and tell me… How could Krispy Kreme not work out… Haha. Lol. That was a small amount anyway lol.
@Knowsstuff - Vanguard doesn’t manage our portfolio, so our only fees are what their mutual funds charge, but we have the ability to talk to a financial advisor when we want to get suggestions/help with what to do with our portfolio.
So what is a good rate of return after fee’s are paid? I know it’s not a apples to apples comparison and increased risk will give more upside…
Also heard on WBBM Chicago about hedging your portfolio at some point to limit the downside in a crash. Curious your thoughts. I am 58 since I know age comes into play
Returns depend on risk tolerance and portfolio makeup.
My expectation is to perform as well as the market indices for the chosen investment classes (hence why index funds are a good vehicle for a substantial chunk). Anything else is gravy and fortunately we’ve often been able to enjoy a little gravy.
I joke. Not very often. One to two times per year, if that. I’m not a market timer and I follow a buy and hold philosophy, for the most part. I do own index funds but my portfolio isn’t totally passive. I do own some individual securities and will occasionally jettison a dog when I think it appropriate or wake up from my stupor. 