Comments on: I Bought a Mutual Fund…

By: Aury (Thunderdrake)

Aury (Thunderdrake) — Fri, 21 May 2010 02:20:43 +0000

I always considered 401K’s to be a bit of a dangerous vehicle for storing money. Not only because of the horrible tax laws placed upon them, but also because of the recent financial crises going around. Suffice to say though, it was rather pragmatic of you to time your 401K rollovers like that. heavens knows what they vest in with those things.

Personally, I use questrade. I tend to purchase blue chips with them.

By: Blogging Banks

Blogging Banks — Wed, 05 May 2010 21:32:14 +0000

I use zecco for stock trades, since I pay $0 for commissions if my balance is over $25K. I use schwab for individual bond trades, since they charge me $0 commissions for bonds. I also like Schwab’s checking account with my schwab 2% cash back credit card on everything. The cash back is deposited into your brokerage account and you could transfer the earnings back to checking…

I have use fidelity for my 401k, but I don’t really have a choice there ;-).

By: DIY Investor

DIY Investor — Wed, 05 May 2010 16:27:04 +0000

You’re right there is no tax as long as you do not handle the money. Do the transfer custodian to custodian. Go to Schwab for example and they will walk you through it.

By: Lazy Man

Lazy Man — Wed, 05 May 2010 16:18:40 +0000

bb, what tax are you referring to? I was going to think about rolling to a Roth IRA in the future, but just to move from a 401k to a Rollover IRA there’s no tax hit that I’m aware of.

By: bb

bb — Wed, 05 May 2010 15:49:36 +0000

Rollover 401k to IRA now hits you with more tax now!

By: Lazy Man

Lazy Man — Wed, 05 May 2010 15:09:58 +0000

That’s a good idea, Bryan. However, I’m comfortable with my bond holdings now (got Vanguard’s BND ETF in another account). The bond component of the FFNOX seems to raise the expense ratio quite a bit to 0.23. That’s still a great expense ratio overall, but Fidelity seems to offer better options if you do it yourself.

By: Bryan

Bryan — Wed, 05 May 2010 14:35:27 +0000

Check out Fidelity’s FFNOX index. Low cost and quite a bit of diversification

By: Stephan

Stephan — Wed, 05 May 2010 14:21:34 +0000

I jsut opened an account with ameritrade for my roth ira and have had no issues so far. Its only been a couple of months, so maybe im counting my blessings to early.

By: DIY Investor

DIY Investor — Wed, 05 May 2010 11:15:58 +0000

I use Schwab as well and am happy with them. I agree their reps are helpful.
It looks to me like your consolidation of accounts will help. I find many people can’t get a handle on their investments because they have so many statements, from so many brokers.

By: Wes

Wes — Tue, 04 May 2010 23:36:19 +0000

I use scottrade; $7 stock trades, mutual funds are free with no minimum… not sure about ETF’s. Good service, and a local branch not too far away. My personal investment and Roth IRA accounts are with them, my work 401k is with Fidelity.

By: Lazy Man

Lazy Man — Tue, 04 May 2010 21:39:36 +0000

Looks like it does… for iShare. Maybe I should go with a Fidelity Rollover IRA too.

By: Evan

Evan — Tue, 04 May 2010 20:55:12 +0000

Lazy Man,

Doesn’t Fidelity have Commission Free ETFs?

http://personal.fidelity.com/products/trading/What_You_Can_Trade/WYCT_ETFs.shtml.cvsr

By: Yana

Yana — Tue, 04 May 2010 20:40:50 +0000

I use Charles Schwab. I’m very happy doing so, and like the Investor Checking as well. One thing that has struck me about Schwab is that when you call them on the phone for customer service, you get outstanding service. I don’t like making phone calls, but the few times I’ve had a reason to call Schwab, I’ve been very pleased with the agents. I’ve found them intelligent, helpful, and not annoying as I am used to when dealing with other companies. I’m happy when I hang up and whatever I called about is resolved. They’re so good they make me almost want to call just for the halibut ;)