Hello All,
I'm a new member of the MMM community and figured I would try asking these questions here to get your opinions. I have been working on getting my financial situation in order over the past year (and was delighted to discover MMM several months ago) and have gotten myself to what I think is a good starting position with my investments. But on to the specifics:
I opened a Roth IRA last year and made my maximum contributions for both 2012 and 2013, and then wound up opening a regular taxable brokerage account as well for additional contributions. I use TD Ameritrade and have focused my whole portfolio on using their commision-free ETFs, since it gives me at least some amount of built-in diversification and no-fee trades while I'm still learning the ropes. I've been using all Vanguard funds for the low expense ratios and was happy to see that Vanguard is popular with the MMM community.
The largest percentage of my asset allocation has so far been with the Vanguard Total Stock Market fund (VTI), but I have been reading a lot lately on the Dividends vs. Total Returns debate. From what I have read so far, this seems to be more of a personal taste selection with roughly equivalent returns either from dividend income or capital gains. Some people seem to prefer one over the other, and some even suggest a mixture of both.
I currently hold positions in VTI in both my Roth IRA and taxable accounts, but I am wondering if perhaps I should switch to something like the Vanguard Dividend Appreciation fund (VIG) for my Large Cap position in the IRA and keep the VTI in the taxable account. It seems like it may be a good idea on paper but I am still educating myself on investing and not entirely certain if there'd be any real advantage to doing this or not.
Can any of you offer any advice or suggestions regarding this? Just curious to hear any thoughts or comments you all might have before I rebalance in the near future...
Oh, and some additional info: I am 40 (so a bit of a latecomer to the FIRE movement, but going to do my best to get started) and total value of my IRA and taxable accounts is currently only about $11-12k in each. I also have a 401k at work that I contribute to just enough for the maximum 4% employer match, but that won't be affected by these particular dividend ETF questions...