how often do you meet w/someone to go over your portfolio?

[retiringat50]

DH & I had been leaving ours but thank God we had a few visits recently w/Fidelity. We were all stocks and they took a BIG hit! We were at the highest risk. Now we backed down some and changed things around - about 65% stocks
How often do you meet w/someone to go over your portfolio? it was suggested at least once a year but we can always call whenever we have concerns. (We really have no idea how to do this on our own)

 

[Mysto]

Hi retiringat50. I think that you'll find that most of the members of this board are their own advisors. Even if you want to use one, I would suggest you get some of the books mentioned on this board and become financially literate - (If you want to retire at 50)

There is also a thread on Asset Allocation on the board you may want to go over it. All the best.

 

[megacorp-firee]

Hi R@50, I meet with my advisor once, max twice a year for a review of the portfolio. I get to call for specific advice or help. My purpose is to get another set of eyes on it. This forum is my third 'reality check'.

For example, my cd expired and with rates as low as they are, he gave me the alternative of putting my money into an investment grade 1 yr corporate bond @ 5.865, which I took (yes I know, I have more risk ... but the testosterone and greed combination is lethal). It's a minor part of my portfolio.

 

[W2R]

It was pointed out to me that nobody cares more about my money, than me, and that most individuals could do just as well as their advisors (especially if the fee is taken into account). As a scientist with no training or background in personal finance, this was slightly terrifying to learn.

Since that time I have been reading and educating myself about investing. I think that a lot of people feel it's easy to pull the wool over an older woman's eyes, and so my choice has been to advise myself. So far I invest cautiously - - mainly in broad index funds and Vanguard's Wellesley fund, with a very conservative 45:55 asset allocation. I would suggest visiting the diehards.org forums and reading. They have a booklist that includes some good books on investing. Try to determine why your advisor selected the investments that you have, and go from there.

Or, alternately, you could continue as you have and visit your advisor when he recommends that it's time.

 

[REWahoo]

retire@50, as has been mentioned most of us here are DIY investors choosing to avoid the additional cost of adviser fees and the resulting drag on our investment returns. But I realize that isn't everyone's cup of tea.

Even if you have no intention of managing your own investments I would strongly urge you to educate yourself on investing. Armed with more knowledge you might not have allowed yourself to get in that high risk situation you mentioned in your OP. You don't have to become an investment expert but you do need to have enough knowledge to understand what your adviser is recommending and why. That will permit you to use the Ronald Regan investment strategy: Trust but Verify.

 

[Dawg52]

When I worked, our 401k advisor met with us once a year to review. We could also call them anytime. I learned a lot from them in the early years and read a lot on my own concerning investing. Fidelity has called offering their services but I just do it myself. I have an investment mix similar to W2R so not a lot to review from a risk standpoint. I do have a couple of high octane investments but that is done with my play money.

I agree with others, educate yourself as much as possible. But I see no problem with reviewing your portfolio with Fidelity once or twice a year.

 

[Goonie]

......my choice has been to advise myself.

I met with an 'advisor' once or twice. It seemed that their sole goal was to sell me some 'product'.....like an annuity for example. I've never met with an 'advisor' since. (I realize, that had I talked to a 'fee based' planner/advisor it may have been different.....but I didn't know that then....and at this point I think I know enough about investing to be [-]dangerous[/-] confident in my own choices and strategy.)

I've read quite a bit, surfed the 'net quite a bit, and listened to the wise [-]guys[/-] sages here on the E-R Forum, to gain greater knowledge and understanding of personal finance and investing, and have become quite pleased with my ability to make my own investment decisions. And the only 'fee' that I charge myself is an occasional cup of coffee!

 

[hankster]

Daily. The dude lives in my mirror. I've made it a point to educate
myself about age appropriate asset allocation, mutual and index fund
investing and other important aspects of long term retirement investing.
DW is not into this stuff at all, so I've left written information for her
about target retirement funds and direct transfer rollovers so that she
can "set it and forget it" and still be following an investment strategy
that's comfortable for us if something bad happens to the hankster.

Hank

 

[Retire Soon]

My philosophy on investing began about the time of Black Monday, October 19, 1987 when the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost an astonishing 508 points in a single day of trading or 22.9%. There were countless newspaper accounts at the time of horror stories experienced by people who placed their trust in financial advisers, only to lose large sums of money (although those who waited patiently soon saw the Dow rise above Black Monday levels). People need to take responsibility for their own investing and read as many books about personal finance as possible. From that day on, I have learned that absolutely no one care more about my money than I do.

 

[audreyh1]

Never (other than occasionally explaining things to DH).

I can pinged on by my Fidelity guy once every year or two. He is always inviting me for a portfolio review, but I always decline. He offers a few offhand suggestions but overall remarks how well my investments seem to be doing and that I own some "very good funds". His offhand suggestions have always been way off base from my investing style, so I'm not interested in more of same.

Audrey

P.S. It was ALWAYS obvious to me that no advisor would care more about my money or my long term success than I did. On top of that - I have heard too many horror stories.

 

[unclemick]

Never.

After 1966 - 2006 aka forty years of 'legend in my own mind investing' I threw in the towel and bought Target Retirement for real retirement money.

I try not to read books anymore either!



heh heh heh - . Hormones are another thing plus the Pats have a good football team. A 'few good stocks' and watch a little football in season - on which I accept suggestions/opinions.

 

[CuppaJoe]

I met with a stockbroker twice in 1972 and have been on my own ever since. The buzz expression then was, "you mean you don't have mutual funds yet?" That line always got a laugh at work.

 

[Moemg]

I've had Vanguard do a financial plan for me and they offer a yearly review . It's a good time to get all my questions answered and pick their brains .

 

[kaudrey]

I'm a DIY-er too. I have my CFA designation, so I feel qualified. My sister and two of my best friends have me review their portfolios for them once a year.

 

[mn54]

Just out of curiosity, what did your fido rep have to offer in the way of suggestions and advice? Was he pushing any particular fund or looking at your asset allocation and finding what was best for you?

 

[free4now]

It seems to me that the one value advisors can add is helping people who don't know how or why to do assett allocation to get on board with it, and prevent them from doing stupid things. Most people end up significantly underperforming a well-allocated diversified portfolio. Motley fool is a case in point... they started out crowing about how much better their DIY portfolios were doing but the historical result was they all underperformed.

 

[Notmuchlonger]

DH & I had been leaving ours but thank God we had a few visits recently w/Fidelity. We were all stocks and they took a BIG hit! We were at the highest risk. Now we backed down some and changed things around - about 65% stocks
How often do you meet w/someone to go over your portfolio? it was suggested at least once a year but we can always call whenever we have concerns. (We really have no idea how to do this on our own)

Used to be once a year. However for a long period of time now the wife and I educated ourselves and realized it was a waste of time. However, be willing to read up and educate yourself before doing something like this. Im more than happy with saving at least 1% a year by doing it ourselves

 

[friar1610]

I'm pretty much DIY except that I get a (free) yearly financial consult with Vanguard. Most of my holdings are with Vanguard and they pretty much tell me I'm on track. I take that with a bit of skepticism because, although I trust Vanguard, I don't k now if they are just stroking me so I'll stick with them.

I got stiffed by two "financial professionals" in the past, so I have read all the books, done all the research, spent a lot of time on the web researching this stuff (which I enjoy doing). I'm pretty much an index fund investor at this point although I do have some fixed income holdings outside of mutual funds. With an inflation-aadjusted pension from the Navy plus SS (which I just started taking in May at age 62), I'm pretty comfortable with my 5% cash, 47.5% equity and 57.5% bond AA.

Being a military guy, I first got into investing through USPA-IRA (now known as something like First Command). They had sound financial advice (in terms of getting you to invest regularly and with discipline) but the investment choices they offered were designed more to generate commissions for them than to improve my financial security. But, sometimes, you have to learn lessons and I did from that experience. (I never lost any money through them; I just didn't accumulate as much as I could have if I had been more knowledgeable.)

The second "stiffing" was from Fidelity who convinced me to take money out of Fidelity mutual fund I had bought from the above company, pay the capital gains and put it into a variable annuity. The annuity (which I have long-since moved to Vanguard) has made a nice gain over the years, but the tax consequences won't be pretty. Again, I learned a good lesson.

Bottom line: I think the DIY method is the best (after you have educated yourself) but I also think an annual look by another person (who doesn't have a profit motive) is a good idea.

 

[FinanceDude]

Just out of curiosity, what did your fido rep have to offer in the way of suggestions and advice? Was he pushing any particular fund or looking at your asset allocation and finding what was best for you?

He/she can't provide advice other than telling you about Fido funds.........

 

[Nords]

DH & I had been leaving ours but thank God we had a few visits recently w/Fidelity. We were all stocks and they took a BIG hit! We were at the highest risk. Now we backed down some and changed things around - about 65% stocks
How often do you meet w/someone to go over your portfolio? it was suggested at least once a year but we can always call whenever we have concerns. (We really have no idea how to do this on our own)

I always agree to review our ER portfolio with Fidelity over the phone (they don't have a local investor center). The [-]fresh meat[/-] reps usually learn a lot from me about how military pensions & healthcare work, along with Bernstein's advice on asset allocation and where to find low-cost ETFs.

I see it as a calling to educate their staff whenever they give me the opportunity. Now that I think about it, though, I haven't had any of those calls in the last couple years...

 

[megacorp-firee]

I always agree to review our ER portfolio with Fidelity over the phone (they don't have a local investor center). The [-]fresh meat[/-] reps usually learn a lot from me about how military pensions & healthcare work, along with Bernstein's advice on asset allocation and where to find low-cost ETFs.

I see it as a calling to educate their staff whenever they give me the opportunity. Now that I think about it, though, I haven't had any of those calls in the last couple years...

maybe they stopped when you asked for the 1% of your portfolio as your fee ...

 

[FinanceDude]

I always agree to review our ER portfolio with Fidelity over the phone (they don't have a local investor center). The [-]fresh meat[/-] reps usually learn a lot from me about how military pensions & healthcare work, along with Bernstein's advice on asset allocation and where to find low-cost ETFs.

I see it as a calling to educate their staff whenever they give me the opportunity. Now that I think about it, though, I haven't had any of those calls in the last couple years...

While you are providing a valuable service, does it not seem sad that they don't know anything? What kind of "advice" are they providing to folks that don't know what you do??

 

[Bestwifeever]

"My financial planner has my money earning more than 20% a year and he's totally free."

A retired friend sent me the above information since he knows we can do an in-service withdrawal of 401K to roll some or all of it over to an IRA in the near future. I am sort of intrigued to call the friend's FP to find out the true story (I assume he sells commission products only, and we really won't call the FP because surely there would be a hard sell), but would it even be possible to safely earn that much?

Would a Vanguard or Fidelity advisor be better than nothing? There are so many products out there (vs. the 12 or so in the company 401k plan).

 

[donheff]

I used a fee advisor to review my financial plan a year or so before I retired. After I found this board, I stopped paying for advice - now I stop by here to read what you folks are saying to help me second guess my plans

 

[W2R]

"My financial planner has my money earning more than 20% a year and he's totally free."

A retired friend sent me the above information since he knows we can do an in-service withdrawal of 401K to roll some or all of it over to an IRA in the near future. I am sort of intrigued to call the friend's FP to find out the true story (I assume he sells commission products only, and we really won't call the FP because surely there would be a hard sell), but would it even be possible to safely earn that much?

Anything is possible in the short term, but in the long term I would be skeptical. If he can earn more than 20% in the long term, why is he still working at all? I would take what your friend says with a grain of salt, smile, thank him, and continue as you otherwise would.