Newbie and Vanguard IRA rollover

[ewgriff]

Hi! I currently have an IRA with Cetera. As best I can tell and with the reading I have done here, the fees are on the higher side. I have $30,402.00 in the account and was charged a quarterly fee of $137.56 and a yearly fee of $40. It sounds like Vanguard is the way to go to save on these fees, correct? I have no idea what type of funds I need to select once I roll my account over though. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

[nereo]

Hi! I currently have an IRA with Cetera. As best I can tell and with the reading I have done here, the fees are on the higher side. I have $30,402.00 in the account and was charged a quarterly fee of $137.56 and a yearly fee of $40. It sounds like Vanguard is the way to go to save on these fees, correct? I have no idea what type of funds I need to select once I roll my account over though. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Yes, your fees are horrible.  Find a new brokerage, whether it's Vanguard (which I can personally recommend) or another brokerage with low-cost fees.  Give Vanguard a call and they can walk you through the necessary steps, which are all very easy.

What you should invest in is a personal choice.  I like the SP500 fund, others like the total-market index (all US traded stocks), or a target date fund (US + International + Bonds).  Consider filling out an Investor Policy STatement (IPS) to help you along.

G'luck!

[ewgriff]

That's what I suspected! Thank you so much!

[triangle]

I believe you will be charged a $20/year fee with Vanguard until you have 50K invested.  Which is much better than your current company.
https://investor.vanguard.com/investing/trading-fees-commissions

[nereo]

I believe you will be charged a $20/year fee with Vanguard until you have 50K invested.  Which is much better than your current company.
https://investor.vanguard.com/investing/trading-fees-commissions

If you own an index fund or any of their mutual funds you don't have an annual fee, just the stated expense ratio.
The $20/yr fee is if you want a Vanguard Advantage account, which gives you a host of other services, like unlimited check-writing, debit card, etc.

[triangle]

Thanks for correcting that statement about fees. I found another link: https://investor.vanguard.com/investing/account-fees which states that there is a $20/year fee for accounts less than $10K, but that fee can be waved if one also signs up for electronic delivery of statements and other notices.