Personal Capital Fee account

[StillHacking]

So I finally accidentally answered a call from them and now they want to manage some or all my assets. I've been using their software. I have been working with a broker/advisor at Stifel Nicolas for many years. I admit to not tending to things as much as I should but when if ever should a service such as PC be utilized? Is anyone here paying them a fee to manage and are you satisfied? They claim anyone from 500K to tens of millions would benefit from their services. I have one small managed account with Stifel and it. Like all the others I've experimented with over the years has been a bit disappointing.

 

[njhowie]

Can I call you and tell you that you'll benefit from me managing your money? Yes, folks with $500k to tens of millions would benefit from my services as well. Better yet, I'm honest and will only charge you half of whatever Personal Capital is going to charge.

I don't answer any calls. When the folks at Merrill or Fidelity send me email wanting to have a chat (after they try calling and go to voicemail), I tell them all the same thing..."Thanks for reaching out, we're doing fine and do not require any assistance or advice. Now that I have your phone and email address I'll contact you if I need anything more." After that, I rarely hear from them again.

Do not give them any of your money to manage, unless you feel extremely incapable of managing it yourself and are prepared to pay for someone else to do what you can likely easily do on your own.

 

[ImThinkin2019]

We gave them a little money to test and see how it worked out. So far, their performance is very close to the overall market. Not better, not worse. Our self-managed funds also match the market.

Of course, it's only been about 9 months since we started. We'll see how it looks some years from now.

Our overall strategy is to have a number of different buckets with different management strategies. That way we can see if one works better than the other.

That's what we're doing. Maybe not the best plan but we're comfortable with it.

Hope this helps!

 

[Souschef]

I had a good friend that worked for Morgan Stanley, so I let him manage about 100K. About a year later he retired, and I had a new advisor. I let it run for a while, and it was doing OK. It had grown to about $275K. after the market down turn, I was chatting with my advisor and he candidly told me he was getting grief because my account had dropped to $250K.
I solved his problem by moving it all to Fido

 

[COcheesehead]

Speaking as a former business owner, PC has the best sales lead system for financial services. First you give them all your personal financial info - secure of course, cough, then they show you how it’s not on the efficient frontier, cough, cough, then they show you how they can fix it for only a “small” percentage.

 

[StillHacking]

Thanks folks for Confirming what I knew was true. Why pay for performance the same as the market? Maybe it's time to delete my account and just use Quicken. I could just turn completely bombastic and let them think I'm insane in all future communication.
I think I'd rather just go to the beach and visit tiki bars.

 

[xlf11]

Just politely decline their request if you don't want the service. And they probably would not bother to contact you again. No reason to stop using the free tool...

 

[Ready]

I just used an invalid phone number so that I never have to hear from them. What they offer is no different than any other money manager that wants a cut of your returns.

 

[NgineER]

I just used an invalid phone number so that I never have to hear from them. What they offer is no different than any other money manager that wants a cut of your returns.

+1, invalid phone number. No more calls…

 

[OldShooter]

... Why pay for performance the same as the market? ...

Actually, if you could do that (net of fees) over a long period of time that would be a pretty good deal. There's at least 60 years of studies and data, though, showing that active management loses to passive management by at least its costs. Not only fees, but trading expenses, and the biggie: market impact of trades.

If you're up for a little amusement, ask the rep to quantify the "benefit from their services" he will provide and ask how much of that they are willing to guarantee in writing. Otherwise, just take the good advice you're getting here and save yourself the fees and the inevitable underperformance.

For an alternative amusement you could ask the rep why, if he can outperform, he is working as a rep instead of lounging around on his private yacht.

 

[StillHacking]

Here's a link to their performance, or lack of this year. I realize we're in a bear market but their tagline should be, "When the market is bad, we do bad." But we always get our fee.
https://www.personalcapital.com/wealth-management/performance
Their best number is -17%.
I'm experimenting with a small managed account at Stifel. Their performance is only down 5.3% in comparison. I'm overweight in energy, mainly CVX and XOM in my self-managed accounts. My return for the year is +12.08% But then my portfolio is not properly balanced and there has been some drama.