Anyone have thoughts on this?
Target Retirement funds are great because they have the glide slope programmed in, and all you have to do is keep chucking in savings until it's time to retire. That said, I don't have the sense to use something so simple, and prefer to manage all the moving pieces myself. ;^)
I would offer that the glide slope in Fidelity or Vanguard retirement funds isn't that special or magical. It starts off pretty aggressive (say, 90/10), and becomes more conservative a few years out from the retirement date, usually winding up around 50/50. A lot of folks prefer an "age in bonds" formula where your age is the percentage of your portfolio devoted to bonds, so that it becomes conservative more gradually. Since I don't have a strong opinion on US vs international stocks (and more importantly, I know that I don't know more than the next guy about what they'll do), I split the stock portion evenly between the two. So for someone who is, say, 28 years old, a good starter portfolio would be:
36% SPTN 500 INDEX INST (FXSIX) Large Cap Blend 0.05%
36% SPTN INTL INDEX ADV (FSIVX) Foreign 0.17%
28% SPTN US BOND IDX ADV (FSITX) Intermediate-Term 0.17%
It's hard to know which piece will outperform the others over time, but this split is simple, well-diversified, has low costs, and is likely to do well over the long run with occasional rebalancing. Good luck! :^)
