Changing Long Term Investments

[donutdevourer]

I understand the whole trying to time the market and buy high/sell low, but should someone worry about that if they want to change their long-term retirement investments? For example, I want to change my investments to Vanguard Institutional Index Fund Institutional from my current higher expense ratio (0.8-1%). However, I am unsure whether I should just do it now even though the market is higher or wait for a downturn? I am assuming waiting runs counter to the idea that you can’t really predict the ups and downs of the market and when it’s hit bottom.

My psychology is such that I just want to set my investments and forget about them, otherwise, I will obsess and be necrotic over my investment over the long haul and that is no way to live life lol!

Thanks for any help!

[alcon835]

I did something similar last year. Since then the old fund has done better than the new fund. That was only 6 months ago, though, and long term I expect the new fund to do significantly better than the old.

There really is no way to time the market. The thinking that helps me is this: "If I were starting today, knowing everything I know now, with the money I currently have, what would I buy?" and if the answer is, "What I already have" then I would keep it. If the answer is "I'd switch fund X to fund Y" then I make the switch.