Hi - Need help to transfer my Smith Barney IRA

[rouxdog]

Hello,

I have a Smith Barnery Roth IRA (formerly Legg Mason) that was basically opened for me about 10 years ago through my parents' financial advisor. I have two Legg Mason Funds that I was sold at the time (Opportunity & Value Trust Fund) that I have continued to add to over the years and have consequently sunk in titanic fasion over the last few years even starting well before the recession.

I am tired of Smith Barney/CitiGroup and all the high fees, lack of transparency, inability to control my funds easily, and paying for a finanical advisor that offers no assistance. I can not liquidate my funds and do a rollover as I've lost almost all the money that I put into the funds at this time, so I would need to do a transfer in-kind to another brokerage house. Only problem is, I continue to hear about the difficulty in moving Legg Mason funds.

Does anyone know which brokerage-investment houses will accept Legg Mason funds? Need to start fresh and free myself from this inertia that is killing my future retirement.

Thanks!

 

[Gotadimple]

Many will, but you may find that there is a commission to sell them -- should you decide to restructure your account later on. Contact customer service at any of the broker firms you are considering and talk with them about what you want to do.

And welcome to the board.

-- Rita

 

[Cattusbabe]

Before you attempt to transfer check to see if SB still has a exclusive relationship with Legg Mason. When we closed our SB account, for the same reasons you outlined, we found that we could not transfer the Legg Mason account in kind and had to liquidate it.

 

[donheff]

Why not liquidate and transfer the IRA to someone else allocated in accordance with your AA? You will be selling at a loss but buying at a low. If you have cash somewhere else in another IRA you can purchase the equity portion there on the same day you liquidate at Citi if you are worried about missing some up days while you move.

 

[LOL!]

What donheff said.

It is basically trivial to transfer your Roth IRA elsewhere. You don't even have to talk to any SmithBarney folks usually to do so. Find a new custodian (say Vanguard), call them up and tell them what you told us: "I want to transfer my Roth IRA to you." Then do what they say which is usually fill out some forms and mail them in.

It is true you may need to sell your SB/LM funds. So what? Call your broker or login to your account and sell them. They will put the money in cash still in your Roth IRA and cash is easily transferred.

Now usually, folks need a kick in the butt to overcome the inertia of doing nothing. Consider this a friendly kick in the butt. Your next post should state something like,

"Thanks everyone. I finished transferring my Roth IRA away from SB/LM. I feel great about it and it was even easier than you told me it was gonna be."

 

[callsigncharlie]

same situation, question- fees to switch?

Hi,

I am in the same situation except my "kick in the pants" came from my "advisor" selling a portion of my investments without asking or notifying me and putting the proceeds into a citibank in north dakota.

Anyway I have a question, that, like the rest of SB's structure seems impossible to figure out. First, luckily it doesn't appear I have any propietary SB/LM funds. But I am unsure of the fees they may charge to transfer my holdings, and reluctant to ask my advisor until I am certain of making this switch. Someone at Schwab suggested this could be, ballpark, $40.

Of course, I rather feel that this should be waived considering the circumstance of this improper transaction that I am sure the advisor and SB got commission for, but want to figure out what kind of money we are talking about here, whether it's worth arguing over or just to get the heck out!

Thanks in advance-
C

 

[rouxdog]

Transferring to T Rowe Price

Thanks for all the feedback everyone. Looks like I'm heading toward a T Rowe Brokerage IRA which will cost me $30 annually to maintain in order to transfer in-kind my SB/LM funds that I'm currently stuck with. Looking forward to moving on to better things after my nightmare experience with Smith Barney.

 

[freebird5825]

You are doing a great thing for yourself.

dh2b's parents were with said firm for decades.
I cringe to think of the fees they collected from the frequent trades his mom told us about after his father passed in 2005. She was advised that some major trades were necessary to reposition her portfolio properly. She said she trusted them cuz her LH trusted them.
I advised dh2b on a few things to tell his mom, but I personally stayed out of the whole thing. He tried to talk to her, but...well you know...
when dh2b and siblings inherited an IRA from their mom in mid 2007, he and I were amazed at the nonsense coming out of the advisor's mouth via emails to him. The siblings stayed with said firm, mouthing the same "I trust them cuz...".
dh2b broke ranks and had VG handle the traditional IRA transfer. He asked me to serve as his limited agent to get the transfer done in real time before year end 2007. Said firm seemed to be leaving it for last minute.
Said firm dragged their feet in every way possible, for months. One of the siblings actually called dh2b and had pointed questions about me acting as his limited agent.
Gee, I wonder where that idea came from?