Posted: 9/3/2025 3:27:41 PM EDT
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Hey guys, I previously posted a thread about where to roll over a Roth IRA and you overwhelming suggested Fidelity, so that is what I did. I created my new Roth IRA at Fidelity and have requested the transfer. While I am waiting on the process to complete I am starting to think about what ETFS and what ratios I should invest in this new Roth IRA at Fidelity so I thought I would also see what you guys might have ideas on or suggest. So if anyone would like to share what they are doing and why or what I would love to hear it. I am leaning towards ETFs over mutual funds for more passively managed funds so the expense/fee ratios are as low as possible. Thanks, Mav |
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I'd check out Investing Simplified videos on youtube. https://www.youtube.com/@NolanGouveia His 3 fund portfolio seems like a straightforward starting point.https://youtu.be/WDKUyT1AQrw?si=ycbMxZTWhqzBbUiT Its what i've been doing in my brokerage account in addition to individual stocks |
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Originally Posted By Mav3rick: I am leaning towards ETFs over mutual funds for more passively managed funds so the expense/fee ratios are as low as possible. Pick what you want to invest in and then find the lowest fee option. Don't sweat the second decimal on the fees - anything under 0.1% I consider zero and under 0.5% I consider low. Most index funds will be available either way from the same institutions. For example, oneq and fncmx are Fidelity nasdaq funds - first is ETF and second is mutual fund. If you're very young and looking for low fee index funds for the long term you can't go wrong with fidelity's zero fee funds. fzrox is a zero fee total market fund and fnilx is a large cap index fund that performs almost identically to the nasdaq 100. fxaix and fncmx are Fidelity's very low fee sp500 and Nasdaq funds. There are many funds that perform almost identically to the sp500, nasdaq, etc. but they can't call them "nasdaq fund" without paying royalties since nasdaq is a trademark. Fidelity's website has a great fund screening/comparison section (among other super useful information) when you're logged in. You can even filter by expense ratio. |
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What are your retirement goals (how long until you plan to retire)? If you can stomach the volatility, using ETFs like SPMO and SMH gives you exposure to growth sectors without going all in on individual stocks. You’re leaning into momentum and tech, which historically have outperformed the S&P500. |
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FCNTX (Contrafund) mutual fund seems to be well worth the fees they charge over their zero-fee funds. I ran the numbers and after comparing them, selected that one for the vast majority of my holdings. Compare the performance of your options over time and see how they rate. Some of those fees are EASILY wiped away plus more by a very small percentage of extra performance. I was surprised how little it took to negate fees... and I used to only buy zero-fee funds to "save money." Choosing based upon low fees alone is a mistake, IMO. |
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Originally Posted By DDiggler: FCNTX (Contrafund) mutual fund seems to be well worth the fees they charge over their zero-fee funds. I ran the numbers and after comparing them, selected that one for the vast majority of my holdings. Compare the performance of your options over time and see how they rate. Some of those fees are EASILY wiped away plus more by a very small percentage of extra performance....... Choosing based upon low fees alone is a mistake. It works until it doesn't - someday the markets will be down more than they are up for an extended period of time(2000, 2008) and we are past-due for such a correction. That is when you don't want to be in more volatile investments. Yes it easily makes up for it's high fees (0.63%) when the markets are up, but when they are down you lose much more also. Meeting your goals using the least volatile investments possible gives you a higher probability of success than relying on more volatile investments. Note the faster climbs and faster declines of contrafund: Attached File |
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Originally Posted By FrozenWinter: I'd check out Investing Simplified videos on youtube. https://www.youtube.com/@NolanGouveia His 3 fund portfolio seems like a straightforward starting point.https://youtu.be/WDKUyT1AQrw?si=ycbMxZTWhqzBbUiT Its what i've been doing in my brokerage account in addition to individual stocks I will be sure to check him out. Thanks! |
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Originally Posted By Morgan321: There's no inherent difference in fees between a traditional mutual fund and an exchange traded fund. Pick what you want to invest in and then find the lowest fee option. Don't sweat the second decimal on the fees - anything under 0.1% I consider zero and under 0.5% I consider low. Most index funds will be available either way from the same institutions. For example, oneq and fncmx are Fidelity nasdaq funds - first is ETF and second is mutual fund. If you're very young and looking for low fee index funds for the long term you can't go wrong with fidelity's zero fee funds. fzrox is a zero fee total market fund and fnilx is a large cap index fund that performs almost identically to the nasdaq 100. fxaix and fncmx are Fidelity's very low fee sp500 and Nasdaq funds. There are many funds that perform almost identically to the sp500, nasdaq, etc. but they can't call them "nasdaq fund" without paying royalties since nasdaq is a trademark. Fidelity's website has a great fund screening/comparison section (among other super useful information) when you're logged in. You can even filter by expense ratio. Thank you for your input. I am actually in my early 50s, but I think I have approx. 15 years still until I feel I can retire. I have seen mentions of FXAIX, but not the other ones you mentioned. I will take a look at them. Thanks for the tip about filtering by expense ratio. I will check that out as well. |
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Originally Posted By Liberty_Tree: What are your retirement goals (how long until you plan to retire)? If you can stomach the volatility, using ETFs like SPMO and SMH gives you exposure to growth sectors without going all in on individual stocks. You’re leaning into momentum and tech, which historically have outperformed the S&P500. I am in my early 50s. I have a 401K at work which I started contributing as much as possible to the last couple of years. Other than that I have this roth that I want to try to get going again. My plan is to retire around 65 years of age. By next year I should be debt free as I have almost all my positive debt paid for. I don't carry any negative debt (pay off CC each month fully, no car loans, etc.), and I have a 6 month emergency/savings fund in a HYSA. I have seen a lot of youtube videos talking about DRIP strategies to generate passive income to help towards monthly expenses. That kindof interests me, but for this roth I think I would like to try to grow it as much as possible with as little as risk as possible. I also opened a fidelity brokerage account, but haven't funded it yet. My plan is to start slowly investing in there as well once I get the roth squared away. I don't want to micro manage this stuff, more like maybe set it and forget it with me checking it maybe quarterly. Don't want or am not interested in chasing the market as they say. |
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Originally Posted By DDiggler: FCNTX (Contrafund) mutual fund seems to be well worth the fees they charge over their zero-fee funds. I ran the numbers and after comparing them, selected that one for the vast majority of my holdings. Compare the performance of your options over time and see how they rate. Some of those fees are EASILY wiped away plus more by a very small percentage of extra performance. I was surprised how little it took to negate fees... and I used to only buy zero-fee funds to "save money." Choosing based upon low fees alone is a mistake, IMO. Ok-I will keep that in mind. Thanks for the suggestion! |
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Originally Posted By Mav3rick: I am actually in my early 50s, but I think I have approx. 15 years still until I feel I can retire. Retirement should not be based on feelings, it should be based on numbers that accurately reflect reality. I would recommend that making a financial plan for retirement should be your top priority. Making decisions based on feelings or what random people on the internet tell you is a recipe for disaster. |
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Originally Posted By Morgan321: In your early 50s you should know exactly when you can retire. Retirement should not be based on feelings, it should be based on numbers that accurately reflect reality. I would recommend that making a financial plan for retirement should be your top priority. Making decisions based on feelings or what random people on the internet tell you is a recipe for disaster. Ok. Can you give me some suggestions on how to do this? |
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Originally Posted By Mav3rick: Ok. Can you give me some suggestions on how to do this? Fidelity has a surprisingly detailed free retirement planner on their website when you are logged in. It includes all your assets at Fidelity, lets you enter non-fidelity assets, and uses info like your age, income, and expenses to give you a surprisingly good feel for where you stand. You could get a surprisingly accurate estimate of where you stand if you shared details here - age, assets and debt, expenses, how much you are currently saving, when you want to retire, etc. I would do both of the above and then for more detailed advice find a fiduciary financial planner. ie. one you pay a fixed fee to for advice, not somebody who wants to manage your money for you on commission. It'll cost you a few $, but being face-to-face with a knowledgeable person who has all your information can reveal many opportunities you didn't know existed. I did this for 2024, it cost me $3k for the year but I got objective confirmation that my general plan was sound and achievable and I learned a lot about how to save big-$$$ on taxes while retiring. The transition from working to retired presents a lot of opportunities to save large amounts of money in taxes and flexibility to shift your assets around that don't exist when you are working or when you are "fully" retired (ie. on medicare, collecting SS, entering RMDs, etc). You can easily avoid 6-figure dollar amounts of taxes by not going into retirement blind. |
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Originally Posted By Mav3rick: I am in my early 50s. I have a 401K at work which I started contributing as much as possible to the last couple of years. Other than that I have this roth that I want to try to get going again. My plan is to retire around 65 years of age. By next year I should be debt free as I have almost all my positive debt paid for. I don't carry any negative debt (pay off CC each month fully, no car loans, etc.), and I have a 6 month emergency/savings fund in a HYSA. I have seen a lot of youtube videos talking about DRIP strategies to generate passive income to help towards monthly expenses. That kindof interests me, but for this roth I think I would like to try to grow it as much as possible with as little as risk as possible. I also opened a fidelity brokerage account, but haven't funded it yet. My plan is to start slowly investing in there as well once I get the roth squared away. I don't want to micro manage this stuff, more like maybe set it and forget it with me checking it maybe quarterly. Don't want or am not interested in chasing the market as they say. If you’re learning on Youtube, be aware that there’s plenty of bad advice there. Or anywhere/everywhere. Take a look at Ben Felix (channel) ‘s take on dividend irrelevance. He gives good, boring advice, in my unqualified opinion. I also like “The Plain Bagel”. You may have already figured this out, but dividends aren’t free money. They’re basically a small, repeating withdrawal event occurring that has a drag on portfolio growth. And they drag on the company/fund’s growth, as well, regardless of DRIP. Very generally, ETFs that have higher dividends lag behind ones with lower dividends over time, even with DRIP. Dudes on Youtube talking about making passive income with them don’t illustrate that picture very well, and when you run the numbers, you’ll see that it takes giant piles of holdings or high yields to make money worth talking about. And the higher the dividend, the poorer the long term performance, generally. Usually. Income in retirement can just as easily come from selling shares. But that’s easy for me to say, with a little more horizon to work with. As to which ETFs, a lot of guys look for the stability of a low-cost SP500 fund as a centerpiece. I use VOO, Fidelity might have an even lower expense ratio version; dunno (edit: FXAIX). With these, the only two things that matter is that they reliably track the index and have a low expense ratio. Other dudes use VTI or VT in the same way. There’s a forum called bogleheads with a wealth of info where those ETFs come up a lot. Highly recommend reading there. Another index fund to consider is QQQ/QQQM. Big fan. Generally considered higher risk than VOO/SPY, though. More tech-heavy, with a smaller number of holdings. Follows the Nasdaq 100. There are also DIA and Russel based index funds. Non-index funds that hold my interest: SPMO; a momentum factor fund of stocks selected from the SP500 index. About as many holdings (undiversified) as QQQ. MGK and VUG; growth funds that are not index based. SPYG; growth factor fund of stocks selected from SP500. SPHQ; quality factor fund of stocks selected from SP500. Performance historically has been similar to SP500 after accounting for its little higher expense ratio. Dividend tilt ETFs include FDVV, VIG, SPYD, if you feel compelled to choose that path. FDVV has a relatively high expense ratio. Historic performance has made up for that when compared to other dividend tilted ETFs that I’ve looked at, but there’s no guarantee that will continue. Any year it could turn into just another underperforming fund with an elevated expense. VIG seems ok, not great, but pretty good. SPYD is pretty mediocre, but has good dividends. Even after accounting for those dividends, it underperforms the SP500 pretty consistently. Its holdings are picked based on yield from the SP500, and they’re generally below-average performers compared to the rest of the SP500. The SP500 derived funds like SPYD, SPYG, and SPHQ are by definition less diversified than the SP500 or an index fund. Just some tickers to punch in to google. It is completely reasonable to ignore all of this and just buy VOO (or FXAIX) or maybe a low-expense target retirement fund, in my opinion. Portfoliolabs(dot)com is a pretty good comparison tool, at least for a 10yr retrospect. Edit: GDX and XAR are also worth looking at, maybe. GDX is more useful for an active investor than a passive one, but it has done well for me and is academically interesting. Less tax drag than actual gold, and largely uncorrelated with typical index, growth, or momentum funds. I look at it like a sector ETF to balance my more aggressive plays. XAR is a sector bet on the military-industrial complex. |
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Originally Posted By Morgan321: Most important thing is to know your living expenses because that is what you have to plan for in retirement. Start tracking every dollar you spend now into a few broad categories - housing, food, cars, medical, discretionary(hookers and blow), etc. Many people spend a lot more money than they realize. Fidelity has a surprisingly detailed free retirement planner on their website when you are logged in. It includes all your assets at Fidelity, lets you enter non-fidelity assets, and uses info like your age, income, and expenses to give you a surprisingly good feel for where you stand. You could get a surprisingly accurate estimate of where you stand if you shared details here - age, assets and debt, expenses, how much you are currently saving, when you want to retire, etc. I would do both of the above and then for more detailed advice find a fiduciary financial planner. ie. one you pay a fixed fee to for advice, not somebody who wants to manage your money for you on commission. It'll cost you a few $, but being face-to-face with a knowledgeable person who has all your information can reveal many opportunities you didn't know existed. I did this for 2024, it cost me $3k for the year but I got objective confirmation that my general plan was sound and achievable and I learned a lot about how to save big-$$$ on taxes while retiring. The transition from working to retired presents a lot of opportunities to save large amounts of money in taxes and flexibility to shift your assets around that don't exist when you are working or when you are "fully" retired (ie. on medicare, collecting SS, entering RMDs, etc). You can easily avoid 6-figure dollar amounts of taxes by not going into retirement blind. THanks for the additional information. To be honest I have never tracked my spending. I have always been able to pay all my bills, food, mortgage, etc. on time and still have some left over to save. I will check out the Fidelity Retirement planner and see what I can figure out. I don't feel comfortable sharing all that here, but if you are willing to continue to help me I can message you some of the details once I know better what they are. In regards to fiduciarys-I have tried a few. They seem to only steer me into stuff that makes them money and were less interested in helping me with stuff they don't make money on mainly my 401k and that original roth IRA. One Fudicary put me and my wife in some annunity or something that according to my currentl fiduciary was bad and we can't do anything with it for 15yrs according to them. This current place isn't much better, they hardly ever reach out to me, and it is a hassle going into seeing them. I will let them continue to manage a few assets they set us up in, but I want to try to do some more stuff on my own. |
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Originally Posted By 1168RGR: If you’re learning on Youtube, be aware that there’s plenty of bad advice there. Or anywhere/everywhere. Take a look at Ben Felix (channel) ‘s take on dividend irrelevance. He gives good, boring advice, in my unqualified opinion. I also like “The Plain Bagel”. You may have already figured this out, but dividends aren’t free money. They’re basically a small, repeating withdrawal event occurring that has a drag on portfolio growth. And they drag on the company/fund’s growth, as well, regardless of DRIP. Very generally, ETFs that have higher dividends lag behind ones with lower dividends over time, even with DRIP. Dudes on Youtube talking about making passive income with them don’t illustrate that picture very well, and when you run the numbers, you’ll see that it takes giant piles of holdings or high yields to make money worth talking about. And the higher the dividend, the poorer the long term performance, generally. Usually. Income in retirement can just as easily come from selling shares. But that’s easy for me to say, with a little more horizon to work with. As to which ETFs, a lot of guys look for the stability of a low-cost SP500 fund as a centerpiece. I use VOO, Fidelity might have an even lower expense ratio version; dunno (edit: FXAIX). With these, the only two things that matter is that they reliably track the index and have a low expense ratio. Other dudes use VTI or VT in the same way. There’s a forum called bogleheads with a wealth of info where those ETFs come up a lot. Highly recommend reading there. Another index fund to consider is QQQ/QQQM. Big fan. Generally considered higher risk than VOO/SPY, though. More tech-heavy, with a smaller number of holdings. Follows the Nasdaq 100. There are also DIA and Russel based index funds. Non-index funds that hold my interest: SPMO; a momentum factor fund of stocks selected from the SP500 index. About as many holdings (undiversified) as QQQ. MGK and VUG; growth funds that are not index based. SPYG; growth factor fund of stocks selected from SP500. SPHQ; quality factor fund of stocks selected from SP500. Performance historically has been similar to SP500 after accounting for its little higher expense ratio. Dividend tilt ETFs include FDVV, VIG, SPYD, if you feel compelled to choose that path. FDVV has a relatively high expense ratio. Historic performance has made up for that when compared to other dividend tilted ETFs that I’ve looked at, but there’s no guarantee that will continue. Any year it could turn into just another underperforming fund with an elevated expense. VIG seems ok, not great, but pretty good. SPYD is pretty mediocre, but has good dividends. Even after accounting for those dividends, it underperforms the SP500 pretty consistently. Its holdings are picked based on yield from the SP500, and they’re generally below-average performers compared to the rest of the SP500. The SP500 derived funds like SPYD, SPYG, and SPHQ are by definition less diversified than the SP500 or an index fund. Just some tickers to punch in to google. It is completely reasonable to ignore all of this and just buy VOO (or FXAIX) or maybe a low-expense target retirement fund, in my opinion. Portfoliolabs(dot)com is a pretty good comparison tool, at least for a 10yr retrospect. Edit: GDX and XAR are also worth looking at, maybe. GDX is more useful for an active investor than a passive one, but it has done well for me and is academically interesting. Less tax drag than actual gold, and largely uncorrelated with typical index, growth, or momentum funds. I look at it like a sector ETF to balance my more aggressive plays. XAR is a sector bet on the military-industrial complex. Wow-this is a lot to unpack. I never heard of a lot of those. I hear you about youtube. It seems there is a lot of videos from people that say stuff like "SDHD" is great" then other videos where they contradict that. I haven't heard of that person, but I will check him out. I am kindof liking the guy another person recommeded earlier above, Professor G. He seems more straight forward, but then even he sometimes slightly contradicts himself. I do like his idea of the 3 ETFs for simplified investing. Here is a shortcut to his video but basically he suggests  Best 3 ETF Portfolio Buy & Hold FOREVER: “BEST Simple Investing” One Foundational (VOO, SPY,SPLG, or VTI) One Stable (SCHD) One Growth (QQQM, SCHG, or VUG) He did a whole video on it and then broke down what percentages for each depending on what age bracket you are at. It seems pretty straight forward but I am still watching other videos and haven't decided yet. I see a lot of videos about passive income with all these dividend etfs, but it seems like I don't have enough money and time to really be worth investing in them heavily as the monthly dividends won't be high enough to really help much with passive income as I am looking at 13-15 years until I am 65. |
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Originally Posted By Mav3rick: To be honest I have never tracked my spending. I don't feel comfortable sharing all that here…. In regards to fiduciarys-I have tried a few……. That’s the common response. Seems silly to me given that you can find out anything about anybody pretty easily these days. Birthday, ssn, mom’s maiden name, etc, are all available for anybody. Knowing how much somebody makes and how much they save is useless information in terms of identity theft. Like any profession there are good ones and bad ones. Anybody who recommends an annuity or complex whole life insurance policies to anybody still working should be avoided. Once you’re retired it’s still buyer beware because you’re paying an extremely high price for a small amount of security. Given what you’ve told us, a good advisor for you would be looking at your savings by type(pretax, taxable, tax exempt) and adjusting where you save to best meet your situation. Then he would focus on what you are invested in - if you can easily meet your goals then you can be more conservative, if your goals are lofty then you have to either accept more risk or lower your goals. |
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What I said above about FDVV’s expense ratio is incorrect. It’s not a bad E/R. I’ll listen to that 3-fund video soon. I think the concept is good. It’s a pretty popular strategy for people that don’t want to be overly active but don’t want to put it all on VOO or FXAIX or whatever, and don’t want to do bonds. My own portfolio shares some strategy with the 3-Fund approach. |
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At your age, I would build a simple Lazy Portfolio of two ETFS: VTI (total stock market index) and BND (total bond market index) In a Roth, I'd prefer VTI only for the most aggressive tax free growth, and put the BND in a pre-tax IRA or 401k. Both can be traded with no fees at Fidelity. The mix/percentage is up to you.... at 15 years out, I'd be inclined to be 100% VTI in a Roth, and start adding BND into the mix when you get 10 years out, rebalancing every year. |