So was on the phone with Vanguard regarding transferring an existing Solo 401K from E-Trade. One big downside of the Vanguard Individual K is that you can only have investor shares in it. So I'd probably put it all into Life-Strategy Growth and call it a day - no money to be saved by breaking out the funds as Admiral Shares are not available.
So that would be an ER of .17%.
At E-Trade, I could switch what I'm doing now to a 3 fund portfolio with Vanguard ETFs, and achieve a similar portfolio - I think at lower cost (a much lower cost in terms of paperwork)?
So the ER at my weightings would be .0765% (55/25/20 in the big 3). Call it .09% with the Bid-Ask spread factored in But I'd have to pay comissions on purchases. I purchase $2000 in a low-month (at the beginning of the year, much more to cover the 18K employee contribution). ETF purchases at E-Trade are 9.99. So $30 to buy all 3 every month would be 1.5% or less, to save ~.08% on fees annually. That doesn't look so good - about an 18 year breakeven. But if I had a policy of buying a minimum of $2K per fund each month, that caps the "load" at 0.5% or so about a 6 year breakeven. With sufficient assets (already have 100K in this account), I don't think I'd get too far off from my target allocation with this policy.
Leaning towards staying with E-Trade on this. What do you think?