I don't turn up my nose at small-cap and value. My equity portfolio is about 50% small-cap and tilted to value and has been for years.
OK I misunderstood.
This is why I can state that one can do it without DFA.
True, but good diversification across sectors and across countries would probably take 100+ stocks or using mutual funds. In the latter case, then, the issue is the FA fee for access to DFA. When I first considered this experiment I checked and found several that would provide access for a reasonable flat rate, though I don't remember details.
As for recently, the videos show trailing in 2015 for DFA. And in 2017, small-cap value DFSVX is up 3.31% through 11/17/2017 according to morningstar.com. Compare that to VTSAX (Vanguard Total Stock Market) with 16.73%.
Apples and Oranges. DFSVX is designated by DFA as a "component" fund intended to be used to tilt a more diversified portfolio. To compare it to the total market, pro or con, is to miss the point. Re performance, every dog has its day. This year has not been all that good for little dogs.
But you tell me, please. What is the performance YTD of your $100K test DFA portfolio? And what is its asset allocation?
Sure. Here is some E3Q YTD data from my test portfolio spreadsheet:
DFA 16.6%; DFQTX US Core Equity 50%, DFIEX Intl Core Equity 37%, DFCEX Emerging Markets Core 13%
Couch Potato 15.7%; 70% US Total Mkt, 30% Intl Total Market
ACWI All Cap 17.76%
Schwab Robot 14.9%
The Couch Potato is a no-rebalancing portfolio that I started on 12/31/2014 at 65% US, 35% Int. The "Schwab Robot" is a test that I have terminated because it junked up my records with like 15 funds and wasn't doing anything remotely interesting.
So, over this period that is too short to use for evaluation, the DFA portfolio (net of fees) essentially equaled your VTSAX but provided worldwide diversification. So I would say it "won" a meaningless race. I'll wait until it has run for a couple of years before I start projecting race results. YMMV of course.