[Nina]

Finally met with Edward Jones Financial advisor this morning and they offered us two options to help us manage our cash.

They charge 1.4% if they create a mix of ETF and mutual funds and manage them on quarterly basis or additional 0.3% (1.7%) if they create a personalized Mutual fund for us which includes stock investing and ETFs. Is that a fair fee?

We do not have time to do much on our own as we both work a lot of hours.

If we decide to invest into ETF on our own – how would we go about that? What is the cost of that usually? Feeling lost

Have a chunk of money that we want to put in account and not worry about for the next 5-7 years but want it to grow.

[Sarah]

Read the simple path to wealth before you do anything

[Tristan]

I used to work at jones (I left for several reasons and don’t have any legal holdings to not tell you why if interested). They aren’t really creating you a personalized mutual fund.

The program they are talking about, “advisory solutions” is supposed to be a tax efficient way of creating a portfolio.

It’s not necessarily that it’s not, but I never used it with clients because I never saw the return or value being worth any more than what I did in the guided solutions account.

And it takes the job off the advisor, they don’t manage any of it really, home office advisors do, so I never felt OK charging a client something that I wasn’t actually managing.

From an advisor perspective, it’s great, get paid essentially the same (the increase fee mostly goes to home office) and not do really any of the work.

But then again, jones essentially incentivizes clients to do as minimal work for clients as legally possible so they can spend more time getting new assets in.

Going independent I’ve realized even more how much work actually goes in to managing a portfolio and doing what is best for my clients vs doing things the “jones way”

[Colleen]

I would definitely not allow someone to take that much money for a process you can automate yourself.

[Kristen]

Another reason to avoid Edward Jones. They use proprietary funds, e.g., Bridgebuilder funds.

If you leave EJ you have to sell everything AND pay $75 per account. Ridiculous.

[Angie]

Do not give them tens of thousands of dollars to do nothing!! Yes, 1.4% can be a large amount of money over decades.

Open a basic investment account and a Roth IRA at the brokerage of your choosing. Invest it all in an ETF that follows the S&P500, like SPY.

If you’re young and don’t mind a little more volatility, invest half in the S&P500 and the other half in the NASDAQ 100, like QQQM.

You never need to mess with it again. These ETFs that follow an index are already adjusted quarterly.

If you want to invest monthly, you’ll need a mutual fund (index fund) that follows the S&P500.

The index fund allows you to invest a set amount each month that you have transferred over from your checking account.

Good luck! Listen to some audio books and learn at much as you can. It’s simple, but people are intimidated.

[Gordon]

Thats over
a million dollars in fees compounded over a lifetime…
Scam!

[Kelly]

You’re wise to ask. That’s crazy expensive! Talk to someone else (not with E J).

[Jakub]

The cost of buying ETF for yourself could be as low as 0.03% or even no fee at all. I believe Fidelity does have a mutual fond like that.

If he wants to charge you 1.4%, he should be very well able to prove you how he delivered more than the market average (eg. SP500) for the past 10+ years. Chances are he did not.

I wouldn’t bother with them. Just simply buy ETF like VOO by yourself, it will do the trick.

[Judy]

Just throw your money into the S&P and let it ride for 10-20 years don’t need to pay anyone!

[Anna]

Please do NOT use Edward Jones ever! Total rip off. Just read a couple books and you’ll understand why.

Start with The Simple Path to Wealth by JL Collins and then I’ll Teach You to be Rich.

[MoBay]

No offense why you don’t just open up a Vanguard account and do it yourself it’s not hard you can get it all and no fees plus you can manage yourself, buy and sell with no problem, just asking?

[David]

That 1.4 or 1.7% compounds over time. You are giving up a ton of money in the long run.

There is a handful of books repeatedly recommended in here, Simple Path to Wealth by JL Collins, Little Book of Common Sense Investing by Bogle, there are several others but they all cover the same basic ideas. Read one or two of those and it will be obvious you can diy this.

I get that you don’t have time to read a book right now (they are quick reads).

Just put everything in a low cost s and p 500 index until you get a chance to read the books.

[David]

Stay away from them. If you truly need guidance lots of low cost advisor options out there from Vanguard, Schwab etc.

[Troy]

No! Over 30 years that’s half your gains! We spent so much time, energy and effort earning our money spend a little bit of time and learn how to manage it yourself.

[Cynthia]

You can do it yourself. You said yourself that you want to set it and let it sit. Find the time to invest in yourself, set it up then let it sit.

[Ronald]

Hope they’re giving you more value (e.g., financial planning, tax minimization, liquidity analysis, investment strategy, etc.) than just plain vanilla funds

[Author]

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