Should I engage with Personal Capital?

[xclonexclonex]

Hello all,

Quick background here. The following is my financial situation -

Account 1   $1,442.85
Account 2   $1,533.85
Account 3   $1,000.95
Account 4   $97,518.58
Account 5   $42,646.71
Account 6   $95.49
Account 7   $4.95
Account 8   $0.85
Fidelity PCI 401k   $9,581.59
Vanguard Roth IRA   $4,581.67
Account 9   $425.45
Total   $158,508.20


Side note - I am looking to consolidate accounts, and get rid of accounts I don't use often, and also going to invest my money.

Back to the situation at hand - I put all this information into Personal Capital, and one day I get a phone call from someone at Personal Capital. This was unsolicited. I was told that I am entitled to a complimentary review of my account, and that I would be given a call by one of their financial advisers.

During this conversation I learned that Personal Capital would engage a third party company (whose name I can't remember), and they would handle my money, and invest. I am free to pull out my money whenever I want without any penalties. This service is going to cost me 0.89% of the assets I invest in.

I am not sure what to think about this. On one hand, regardless of all the reading I do, I feel ill equipped to deal with the stock market, and on the other hand, I do not like the idea of this company handling all my money on my behalf. Now, I do not know how different this is compared to Betterment.

Any suggestions?

Also, did I make a mistake feeding my info into Personal Capital?

EDIT - I have a tentative follow up call scheduled with the same adviser on Friday (8/6/2015). Is there any point in talking to this gentleman again? Or should I just cancel it?

[matchewed]

No you didn't make a mistake in feeding your info to Personal Capital. They get a bit pushy with their services and the like but you can walk away whenever.

Do not pay a .89% for management. Learn how to invest simply and easily. Ignore the fact (for now) that you have a million accounts with all sorts of money in all sorts of places. Read the following -
http://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/
http://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Investment_policy_statement

After you've read the first link and applied it to your own personal take on the second link feel free to open an account at Vanguard or Fidelity or anybody else that can offer low cost index funds and invest appropriately to what you outlined in your IPS.

As for your million accounts you'll need to find out where they are, what they're invested in, and what are the fees. Determine whether you need to sell or do transfer in kind and whether either of them are worth it.

[xclonexclonex]

Thank you so much, appreciate the advice.

[ShoulderThingThatGoesUp]

Their free advice is no better than what you can do on their website, so I won't block out time for the call again, but the website is useful and I don't mind that they try to make money off of it. Nothing they're offering is worth.89%.

[forummm]

Do not pay 0.89% for management. If you just put your money in Vanguard, leave it there, and keep adding to it, that's all you need to do.

https://personal.vanguard.com/us/funds/tools/recommendation
https://personal.vanguard.com/us/FundsInvQuestionnaire

[ShoulderThingThatGoesUp]

Hilariously, their pitch amounts to saying they can make you 1% more annualized, no guarantees of course. So that extra .11% will really help you out!

[xclonexclonex]

Thank you everyone for your help.

I am going to email them and ask them to cancel our Friday meeting. I am going to learn and figure this out myself. Its better in the long run anyway. I mean if the market sinks, it sinks...nothing I can do about it. I will make sure I have cash reserves, so I won't be homeless.

I also sent an email to the banks this morning letting them know that I am want to close my accounts. I have a feeling by the end of this week, I will be down to 4 accounts.

[catccc]

I believe their practice is to call anyone with a net worth over $100K.  I also got the call and ended up having a meeting or two, and in the end I decided I was fine with my current method of investing.  I'd have skipped it had I seen the outcome in advance.  But that's for my situation.  I can see someone else have a benefit from their very basic advice, if they weren't already investing in a low cost way.