In a previous thread we got off subject of steak dinner sales. We were discussing the merits of financial management with a bank wealth advisor, a fiduciary advisor, a slimy licensed insurance salesman that states they are fiduciary, CPA/investment manager turned steak dinner salesman, and those suggesting VG Wellesley fund for a perfect balanced portfolio.
Let me restate my investing history in short order;
No one would provide any performance data, but Creative Planning provided us an exact asset allocation plan with ETF's and MF they would have invested in. So I have built two model portfolios, and our last portfolio from June starting values in July 1 to track could of versus should of, versus what is.
Creative Planning has a model that tries to balance risk very similar to WTB, however, they use lower cost ETF's, 3 moderate cost MF. WTB has 66 positions, with 1/3 in stock equities, the rest in MF, no ETF's. Our TD account had a high allocation in Nasdaq related stocks, and large cap through MF and high sector weighting in Health, which lead to very strong returns last year and this year. Primarily in 13 funds.
So judging from performance alone, net of fees, our old TD portfolio, would have been up 1.4%, Creative Planning down 0.5%, and WTB down .23%.
Since we have not gotten any other benefits from the bank to date, we can only judge on performance, and for one month out, it would appear we made a poor move.
Now for this same period VG VWIAX is up 1.15%, but YTD up to July 1, it was down .4%. We have <.25M in another account solely in a Vanguard Target Date 2045 fund. YTD as of June up 3.62%, July 1 to present up another 0.9%.
Since it is very poor to judge a performance over 30 days, I question the results, but it would appear we should have either stayed with the winner at TD, or moved to either of the two Vanguard funds. Can others chime in on this to confirm any similar history and where they are now comfortable in retirement?
Let me restate my investing history in short order;
- 18 yo-buys first Bankers Acceptance note from a Savings and Loan 19% interest, and collected all funds back before it went into default whew! Lesson learned, risk/reward, got lucky
- 22 yo-starts 401K investing the max for the next 39 years-worked well except having to give 1/2 to first wife at age 38 (bitter story)
- 38 yo-Get involved with Dean Whitter Investments, actually had some great 3rd party investment manager, paid fees to both, but returns were very high over 20%/yr for a few years
- 40 yo-Fire Dean Whitter prior to market downturn, invest on own DYI using mutual funds, not bad, not great
- 43 yo-try using Louis Nevallier weekly stock buy and stop loss method-got killed by sweeps of stop losses
- 45 yo-new wife, owns business, need fancy accountant, hire CPA firm to manage wealth and taxes-does OK for 10 years then looses 1/2 in the downturn, then CPA starts Madrona fund AFTER the crash in 2009, proceeds to loose even more than lost in the 2008 down-we run
- 57 yo-Steak Dinner-RBC bank does OK with 3rd party managers but total fees >2%, but sells DW Jackson Annuity under pressure, and put 50K into a junk rated Citigroup bond like derivitive Performance OK but underperformed market
- 58 yo-Love those steak dinners, Absolute Return Solutions, 6 months of weekly sales pitch in the form of guiding us to sell us annuities-move our money, wake up, and run away-only after selling the annuity for a 7% loss on top of a negative performance, tipped off by their poor understanding of the Citigroup bond which I would not let them sell. (Only Citigroup has the right to buy, and at what price they set)
- 59 yo-Found a very mature 75 yo advisor using TD who used to managed an Edward Jones office. Very aggressive, active mutual fund trading, based on real performance, he beat the market after fees, but fees were 1.2% on the first 1M plus average expenses on the funds around .8%, Fixed income balance performance was very poor with MF. We were not comfortable with the small number of clients and AUM, but now we may find the grass is not greener with larger AUM firms.
- 60 yo-decided we needed a bond ladder, and fresh look at balanced performance, ended up going in depth with Creative Planning-Peter Mallouk's company, but local rep, and looked at Badgley Phelps a local high NetW manager, along with Washington Trust Bank, primarily a wealth manager office in western Washington, but a bank from the other side of the state.
No one would provide any performance data, but Creative Planning provided us an exact asset allocation plan with ETF's and MF they would have invested in. So I have built two model portfolios, and our last portfolio from June starting values in July 1 to track could of versus should of, versus what is.
Creative Planning has a model that tries to balance risk very similar to WTB, however, they use lower cost ETF's, 3 moderate cost MF. WTB has 66 positions, with 1/3 in stock equities, the rest in MF, no ETF's. Our TD account had a high allocation in Nasdaq related stocks, and large cap through MF and high sector weighting in Health, which lead to very strong returns last year and this year. Primarily in 13 funds.
So judging from performance alone, net of fees, our old TD portfolio, would have been up 1.4%, Creative Planning down 0.5%, and WTB down .23%.
Since we have not gotten any other benefits from the bank to date, we can only judge on performance, and for one month out, it would appear we made a poor move.
Now for this same period VG VWIAX is up 1.15%, but YTD up to July 1, it was down .4%. We have <.25M in another account solely in a Vanguard Target Date 2045 fund. YTD as of June up 3.62%, July 1 to present up another 0.9%.
Since it is very poor to judge a performance over 30 days, I question the results, but it would appear we should have either stayed with the winner at TD, or moved to either of the two Vanguard funds. Can others chime in on this to confirm any similar history and where they are now comfortable in retirement?