Comments on: Specific Mutual Fund Investment Ideas For Beginners

By: ING Direct Sharebuilder Merger: Review and My Suggestions » My Money Blog

ING Direct Sharebuilder Merger: Review and My Suggestions » My Money Blog — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 04:10:20 +0000

[...] to contributing at least $50 every month direct from their bank account. This is similar to what T. Rowe Price or TIAA-CREF does. Since they own the funds, they would still make money off the built-in management fees (expense [...]

By: Matt

Matt — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 18:32:48 +0000

Excellent article, i have searched the internet all over for simple down to earth advice like this and its hard to find. You might be some dude online but your article is simple to understand and you don’t have a profit to gain so its easier to trust. Thank you

By: Hey Jonathan, How Do I Start Investing For Retirement? » My Money Blog

Hey Jonathan, How Do I Start Investing For Retirement? » My Money Blog — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 12:30:18 +0000

[...] deposit system. I know it sounds nice to “start investing with $100″ (and here are some ways to do that), but honestly, if you don’t have $3,000, your focus should be more on saving money by [...]

By: AnakM

AnakM — Thu, 08 May 2008 23:34:41 +0000

Scotttrade charges $17 to buy mutual funds. After reading all the comments, I wonder if I should send a check for an extra $17 when I put money in my IRA to cover the charge? I just dont want to get into trouble for putting in too much money into my IRA.

The other MAJOR thing Jonathan and fellow investors, don’t forget that for year 2008, the max limit for Roth IRA and Traditional IRA is $5,000 EACH. After 2008, the maximum limit will be indexed to inflation. Yay!

By: Can Your Spouse/Partner Manage The Family Finances Without You? » My Money Blog

Thu, 08 May 2008 13:37:03 +0000

[...] portfolios, so I would definitely prefer for her learn on her own first. Maybe I would suggest a simple Vanguard Target Retirement fund as an auto-pilot option in the [...]

By: billy

billy — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 09:09:24 +0000

besides putting money in a high yield savings acct. would you recommend putting money in a money market fund? taxable or tax exempt if im in the 25% bracket

By: Kunal Shah

Kunal Shah — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 11:24:39 +0000

Can anyone let me know what is the best mutual fund that I can invest here in India??? I have some of the investments that I need to make before I pay my returns.

By: What’s The Best Broker To Start My Roth IRA? » My Money Blog

What’s The Best Broker To Start My Roth IRA? » My Money Blog — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 20:37:42 +0000

[...] Minimum to start: Most index funds have a minimum opening balance of $3,000. The STAR fund (VGSTX) lets you start with $1,000. More information here. [...]

By: Dave

Dave — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 00:50:30 +0000

I like Vanguard, too. If your household (every family member at your address) has $100K of combined assets at Vanguard, you become a Vanguard Voyager and they’ll let you open a free brokerage account (or many).
So, for example, if you, your spouse & your kid’s education accounts total >= $100K and you’ve got a big chunk committed long-term in the Vanguard Total Stock Market Index fund (VTSMX), you could open a brokerage account for that holding and switch to the comparable Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF (symbol VTI). You’ll have essentiall the same holding returning slightly more at a lower expense ratio.
The trading cost is $20 per trade or .20/share (whichever is higher). So, this probably isn’t for investments less than $10K and using the brokerage is NOT a good strategy for dollar cost averaging.

By: Thomas

Thomas — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 01:41:25 +0000

Inna, always roll them into an IRA so YOU have control of the funds you invest in and you can do whatever you want with the money (but don’t take it out or anything)

By: inna

inna — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 19:05:09 +0000

I am 31 years old and maried. I have 12k in my 401k with fidelity, and they do not grow much, but I do not work there anymore. Nither me nor my husband have an ira accounts. What would be the best plan for me to do with this money, Leave them in 401k or roll them over to roth ira?

By: Rasheed

Rasheed — Thu, 22 Mar 2007 01:33:56 +0000

I’m a recent college grad, and wanted to get into Investing. I do have a job, and 401k is enrolled with wells fargo. My question is this yr my tax guy suggested opening a IRA. I’ve read upon the difference btwn traditional and Roth. Now I’ve read through, and suggestions w/ vanguard, fidelety, ameritrade were given. My question is if you have 20k in savings now. Who’d you open and IRA with. If i’m limited to 4k IRA limitation this yr, what do I do with the rest?

By: Andrew

Andrew — Mon, 05 Mar 2007 19:50:07 +0000

I’ll keep researching this later this week, but off the top of your head do you do you know of any brokerages that don’t charge the hefty transaction fee for the Vanguard funds? Although I guess I could always just go directly to Vanguard – is it similar @ T.Rowe Price/Fidelity that there are no transaction fee’s on their funds if you open an account with them? Once I have more cash to work with, the ultra low cost (but high min purchase) Fidelity funds look pretty promising.

I know Scottrade used to not charge the Vanguard transaction fee (or was way WAY lower than the $50 TD Ameritrade wants to charge me). Pretty sad that I would have to pay that large of a fee just to buy into a low cost index fund D:

The BofA and Wells Fargo trading accounts might also have something – research pending; tips appreciated!

By: Jonathan

Jonathan — Mon, 05 Mar 2007 18:08:39 +0000

Lots of brokers are cheaper – Scottrade, SogoInvest, TradeKing, Zecco, just to name a few. I have accounts at Scottrade and TradeKing, and I like them better than Ameritrade. More details scattered around the blog

By: Andrew

Andrew — Mon, 05 Mar 2007 13:41:50 +0000

Such as….

By: Jonathan

Jonathan — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 23:49:26 +0000

The details seem very vague so far. If it’s just the same $10 trades, I’d say it’s just another $100 bonus promotion and not the best option for long-term investing.

There are definitely cheaper brokers out there with comparable or better customer service.

By: Rush

Rush — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 22:51:57 +0000

Another possibility for those with little initial funds is Suze Orman’s new plan with TDAmeritrade.

http://www.saveyourself.com/

I’m assuming that for opening the account we’ll get some free trades so they won’t eat up the deposit amounts as a percentage, but all of the info won’t be out until 2/27.

Thoughts?

-Rush

By: Starting Your Own Portfolio Out With Limited Funds » My Money Blog

Starting Your Own Portfolio Out With Limited Funds » My Money Blog — Sat, 03 Feb 2007 11:49:43 +0000

[...] 1) Buy an all-in-one fund, and split it up later. Since many fund companies have all-in-one target-dated funds, you can simply buy one of these until you have enough to split into other funds. Here are some specific fund suggestions, starting at only $50 per month. The fund’s asset allocation may not be exactly what you want, but it will be well-diversified, and still much better than other high-cost alternatives. Here’s what the Vanguard Target 2045 Fund looks like: [...]

By: jersey jen

jersey jen — Tue, 23 Jan 2007 05:00:13 +0000

this is an awesome article.

By: karmcon

karmcon — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 22:45:32 +0000

Just one note to keep in mind no matter what fund or investment vehicle you choose…..WATCH your money….dont just put it in there and forget about it…..at least quarterly take a look, if you dont know what to do because the market looks like crapola, transfer to a money market account until you review next quarter….here’s a good example of how NOT watching can be retirement account depletive….

You have 1000 in account. You dont watch and a year later it is 750….you say oh well I’ll make back that 25% so no big deal. The only prob is you need to earn 33% just to break even!! (1000-250 = 750,,,,250/1000 = 25% loss, but you need 250 to break even so 250/750 = 33.33%) It gets even worse if you lose 50% (many did in 2001-2003), then you need to double or find 100% returns just to break even. Moral of story = keep an eye on YOUR money…even if you arent retiring for a few decades.

By: Model Retirement/Investment Portfolios: A Comparison » My Money Blog

Model Retirement/Investment Portfolios: A Comparison » My Money Blog — Sun, 21 Jan 2007 12:39:36 +0000

[...] In my rough guide to investing, I suggested some all-in-one mutual funds for beginners. But what if you want to go a step further and design your own portfolio? Or you have a 401k with only limited choices? [...]

By: Rick

Rick — Fri, 19 Jan 2007 23:41:40 +0000

Nice article. Been reading for a while, first time posting. I’m always learning something new and appreciate the time you put into your site.

By: Ashley Barton

Ashley Barton — Wed, 10 Jan 2007 13:10:04 +0000

If you are going to buy index funds, then there is no better place to open your account than Vanguard. I know lots of mutual fund companies have index funds, but I think Vanguard has the most diverse index options, with the best expenses and the minimum initial investment on most is $3000. You can see these figures on the following pages: Domestic Stock Funds link Aggressive Domestic Stock Funds link Intermediate-Term Bond Funds link If you aren't planning on using index funds or you plan to use indexes and actively managed funds, I would suggest opening your account with Schwab, Scottrade or Firstrade. Schwab (www.schwab.com) and Scottrade (www.scottrade.com) offer you the ability to purchase funds from multiple fund families. IRA accounts have no account fees, and if you purchase funds that are on these companies No Transaction Fee (NTF) lists, then it won't cost you anything to purchase the funds. Firstrade (www.firstrade.com) also provides fee free IRA acounts and provides the ability to purchase funds from almost all mutual fund families. I have had IRA accounts with each of these companies at one point of time, and all have been easy to work with and provided good customer service. I prefer Firstrade because I have the ability to buy almost any no-load fund out there without a transaction fee.

By: Jason

Jason — Wed, 10 Jan 2007 03:54:54 +0000

The Vanguard Star fund is a mutual fund and in general index funds have outperformed mutual funds so I was thinking about going with T. Rowe Price’s EQUITY INDEX 500 index fund in an Roth IRA…Slightly higher expense ratio(.35% vs. .27%,), but everything is similar except the assumption of better past performance(from indexes). The only difference is that they charge they charge low fee balance(less than 10,000) of 2.50 quarterly where as vanguard seems to charge at the end of the year($10). But I figure either way since I can only contribute $4,000 a year I’ll be recieving the fees for 2yrs with the t. rowe price acct and 1 yr with the vanguard acct given I contributue the max.

Also, I have a question about the money market sweep accts t.rowe price makes you select which have their own expense ratios. But given that all of my money will be invested in the equity the majority of the time all I have to worry about is the expense ratios of the index , right?

By: PJ

PJ — Sat, 30 Dec 2006 22:42:19 +0000

I agree with Jonathan about respecting everyone’s opinion.

We should be careful when comparing heavily managed funds like UMBIX with index funds or retirement funds (2045 w/ whoever). It’s almost like comparing apples to oranges.

I have FCNTX because Danoff is managing it. Although it has perform about 2% less than UMBIX this year, my expense ratio is less than 1%. No matter what, I’d stick with Danoff only because I trust his leadership and my expense ratio is less than 1%.

As a friendly suggestion, don’t take expense ratios lightly. If the retirement nest is worth $1,000,000, the cumulative expense ratio over the years can be significantly costly.

If any recommendations are made to buy into retirements like the 2040′s, or index 500 funds I support Vanguard and Fidelity. However, I am bias towards Fidelity because their customer service is excellent. 8/10 service reps I speak to take their time with me and show the most patience I’ve ever received (next to IBM cutomer service). Fidelity service is outstanding.

Fidelity requires a higher minimum ($10K) for some funds, which is tough to swing if you only have $1000 to start with, but if you can swing it I recommend Fidelity over Vanguard. My guess is that Fidelity is trying to keep some funds from bloating too fast which allows managers to allocate money more efficiently especially with the 500 Index funds since some of the components of the S&P 500 change from time to time. Time and time again I see FSMKX gain approximately .01% more than VFINX. FSMKX is about $7.7 Billion where as VFINX is about $71.79 Billion.

Anywho, food for thought. I started my ROTH this year in March with $8000 ($4K for 2005 and $4k for 2006) and it’s up almost 20% with FCNTX (closed to new invcestors) Fidelity 2040 and MA (strict stock).

I also recommend buying BerkshireHatheway Class B stock. That’s a no brainer stock for the next 2 to 3 years.

For any beginners, start with 500 Index fund like VFINX or FSMKX, BRKB, or Total Market Funds.

take care.
PJ