[usnavy_233]

These funds would be held for 5-10 years or more. Probably much more. They have no specific goal. Yeah, I know, you should always have a goal for your money. Ok, the goal for these funds are to make as much money as possible until I decide to start moving into “safer” investments. I agree that a REIT would be ruff for tax purposes, I wasn't thinking about that at the time but you are very correct about that. Strike off CGMRX, although I will still be adding it to my ROTH.

I think we may have different opinions of what "horrible" is. If my fund lost 30% in a week, right after I opened it with $2500, I'm only out $750. I don't see this as horrible. Would I keep it? Yes. Why? Because as long as the dynamics of the fund or the fund manager don't change, I could reasonably expect the fund to perform at a level that it has over the years. As for my additions, my dollar cost averaging would help to recoup my losses even more if I continue to buy monthly after a very bad year. Granted past performance is not an indicator of future profit, but lets face it, if they've been doing it right for the last 5 years and nothing changes, one can (with a certain degree of confidence) expect them to conitue to do it right for the next 5. Obviously, the risk of losing allot of money exist, but for the potential rewards, there's a certain level of risk I'm willing to take.

Now mind you, if the 30% drop was because the fund manager was retiring, the fund decided to shift focus from what they've been doing in the past, the fund manager was asleep at the wheel at didn't shift sectors when one was clearly overplayed, etc then yes, I would have to seriously reconsider my position.

Case and point, the other day CGMFX dropped about 10%. CGMRX drop over 20%, both on the same day. There was new negative news, no rumors of change, no bad quarterly report, etc. Essentially it just happened, with no real explanation. I didn't pull out of CGMFX. Everyone knows that funds go up and fund go down. Since CGMFX has been up far more than down, I'll continue to put money into it until I feel they won't be going up anymore for whatever reason.

Also, I can understand the comments from everyone about being more "safe" but I have a multilayered approach and really, all of my investments could serve as a emergency fund if needed. While I would never want to tap my ROTH, I have that option. While I would never want to borrow from my TSP, I have that option as well, and I can pay it back while still earning 4-5% interest. While I wouldn't plan on selling any of my mutual funds, the option exists if I absolutely had to.

In addition to DODFX, I'm also looking at JMVSX and TRRDX. So far, I like TRRDX allot and it may become the fund I chose to start with instead of DODFX. It's "safer" in that they are a targeted fund and are well diversified amongst many different sectors. They also have only 89% of their allocation in stocks. For me, this is LESS aggressive than I'm used to but since this provides a bit more stability, it's an option I may pursue. It looks like this:
Cash: 3.67%
Stocks: 89.01%
Bonds: 6.51%
Other: 0.81%

I typically like to keep a very aggressive allocation with usually 95% or more in stocks, and very little to nothing in bonds. Even within my TSP account, I have the allocation spread between Common, Small-cap, and International stock with no bond funds. This may not work for those that are very risk adverse but it works well for me. I would be making an exception if I went with a mutual like TRRDX, but in this case, I can see the merits of it.