Hi all!
I am an "old" student who has had an account with Ameriprise for three years. Needless to say, I have joined the club of the ignorant who are slowly educating themselves and realizing what a scam Ameriprise is and switching over to Vanguard.
Reading the posts on people's experience with Ameriprise was like reading my autobiography!! Since I first opened my account with Ameriprise I always had a hunch that my adviser was taking me for a ride but not knowing anything about anything I chalked it up to paranoia. That is, until she did a few things that left such a bad taste in my mouth that I decided to just get rid of her and take over my finances. I'm learning very slowly, but what I am learning is so much fun and interesting! I get an adrenaline rush everytime I learn something about investing for my retirement!
Anyway, a few snapshots of what is going on in my accounts: I have three accounts, a rollover IRA, an SPS account and the dreaded Variable Annuity. I called Vanguard to switch over my IRA and I called Ameriprise to liquidate my SPS which I will drop into Vanguard as well.
Question 1: Do I have reason to be livid?? Looking over my IRA and SPS accounts I see that there is a total of approximately $60,000 dollars invested in seven funds. The average Front Load fee is 5.0%, average expense ratio is 1.3%, average 12b-1 fee is 0.3% and average Morningstar rating is 3 (five of the funds are 2 but there is a 4 and a 5 star that bring up the average to 3).
Question 2: Is there a compelling reason why anyone invest in funds with low Morningstar ratings? I'd like to think that my adviser had a good reason.
Question 3: In my variable annuity, can I regularly take out the amount available without surrender charge and reinvest that in my Vanguard account? I see in my account that this amount is about $1600 and I figure this is a nice sum to reinvest away from Ameriprise (!).
I'm so glad I found this forum. You guys rock!! I also ordered a whole bunch of books from Amazon to educate myself, books that were recommended in the mymoneyblog site.
Soon I'll be advising my friends!!
I am an "old" student who has had an account with Ameriprise for three years. Needless to say, I have joined the club of the ignorant who are slowly educating themselves and realizing what a scam Ameriprise is and switching over to Vanguard.
Reading the posts on people's experience with Ameriprise was like reading my autobiography!! Since I first opened my account with Ameriprise I always had a hunch that my adviser was taking me for a ride but not knowing anything about anything I chalked it up to paranoia. That is, until she did a few things that left such a bad taste in my mouth that I decided to just get rid of her and take over my finances. I'm learning very slowly, but what I am learning is so much fun and interesting! I get an adrenaline rush everytime I learn something about investing for my retirement!
Anyway, a few snapshots of what is going on in my accounts: I have three accounts, a rollover IRA, an SPS account and the dreaded Variable Annuity. I called Vanguard to switch over my IRA and I called Ameriprise to liquidate my SPS which I will drop into Vanguard as well.
Question 1: Do I have reason to be livid?? Looking over my IRA and SPS accounts I see that there is a total of approximately $60,000 dollars invested in seven funds. The average Front Load fee is 5.0%, average expense ratio is 1.3%, average 12b-1 fee is 0.3% and average Morningstar rating is 3 (five of the funds are 2 but there is a 4 and a 5 star that bring up the average to 3).
Question 2: Is there a compelling reason why anyone invest in funds with low Morningstar ratings? I'd like to think that my adviser had a good reason.
Question 3: In my variable annuity, can I regularly take out the amount available without surrender charge and reinvest that in my Vanguard account? I see in my account that this amount is about $1600 and I figure this is a nice sum to reinvest away from Ameriprise (!).
I'm so glad I found this forum. You guys rock!! I also ordered a whole bunch of books from Amazon to educate myself, books that were recommended in the mymoneyblog site.
Soon I'll be advising my friends!!
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