Fees are bad, and retirement plans are full of them.  Just as your investments compound over time, turning relatively small contributions into a substantial nest-egg, so too do expenses.  Every dollar in expenses taken out of your account today could easily reduce your nest-egg by $30 or more decades from now, just when you need [...]

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For a few brief months every four years, Washington pretends to actually care what the rest of the nation thinks. That magical, mystical time is commonly referred to as “election year”. In case you’ve been living under a rock, prospective presidential candidates have been promising voters anything and everything under the sun in exchange for [...]

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Former and current employees of Wal-Mart (WMT) last month filed a lawsuit (currently seeking class-action status) seeking $60 million in damages from the world’s largest retailer alleging excessive fees in the company’s retirement plan. As the country’s largest employer with nearly 1.4 million employees and $9.5 billion in 401k assets, the suit alleges Wal-Mart [...]

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Take full advantage of your employer match - If your employer matches 50% of your contributions up to 6% of your salary, that’s an immediate 50% gain on your investment.  Try beating that elsewhere.
Select your plan’s cheapest funds - 401k plans are notorious for offering expensive, sub-par investment options.  This is especially true of the smaller plans.  If that’s the [...]

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I’ve received a few emails asking about my personal IRA allocation.  As my balance grows larger, I will probably add another asset class or two such as foreign small/mid value and maybe some commodities exposure.  In any event, I’ve kept things fairly simple.  Here goes…

10% Vanguard 500 Index fund (VFINX)
10% Vanguard Value Index fund (VIVAX)
10% [...]

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