Does it makes sense to ask... how am I doing ?

[zetta]

Re: Does it makes sense to ask... how am I doing ?

I've recently been trying to educate myself on investing in mutual funds (which is what you will be doing inside your IRA or ROTH). At first it's hard to separate the "get rich quick" books from the more conservative and sensible ones, so here are a few reasonable ones that I've found:

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Making Money with Mutual Funds
The Complete Idiot's Guide to Investing
The Complete Idiot's Guide to Getting Rich (great for goal-setting!)
Common Sense on Mutual Funds

I'm still not quite comfortable picking my own funds, and think it's worth using a full-service broker when you're first getting started. You pay more upfront, but the advice you get could make the difference between being being comfortable or poor in retirement.

If you are still in your 30's or 40's, I think the funds in your ORP that are only getting 6% or 8% return are likely too conservative.

[syracusa]

Re: Does it makes sense to ask... how am I doing ?

I've recently been trying to educate myself on investing in mutual funds (which is what you will be doing inside your IRA or ROTH). At first it's hard to separate the "get rich quick" books from the more conservative and sensible ones, so here are a few reasonable ones that I've found:

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Making Money with Mutual Funds
The Complete Idiot's Guide to Investing
The Complete Idiot's Guide to Getting Rich (great for goal-setting!)
Common Sense on Mutual Funds

I'm still not quite comfortable picking my own funds, and think it's worth using a full-service broker when you're first getting started. You pay more upfront, but the advice you get could make the difference between being being comfortable or poor in retirement.

If you are still in your 30's or 40's, I think the funds in your ORP that are only getting 6% or 8% return are likely too conservative.

Yes, DH said we are going to have to change those because they have not done too well. But...does it mean that everytime I move the money into a different fund - I will pay a fee?

It seems like this is eays to do. Fidelity has all this online and I have seen some features that allow you to move the funds. Is this called "managing your own money"?
In any case, I still don't know for sure how to do it because I haven't done it before. DH will have to do it himself...I am so insecure when it comes to this financial/investing stuff.
Like I said before, I grew up in a "go to work/retire/government pays pension/the end" kind of world. That's what I saw my parents do.
But DH used to be a financial planner and he seems to know about all this stuff - so it will be up to him.

[zetta]

Re: Does it makes sense to ask... how am I doing ?

While you're lucky that your DH has a financial planning background, I would still encourage you to educate yourself on the basics. All women should be involved in both the day to day finances and the long term investing. At a minimum, you should learn how mutual funds, IRA's, and ROTH IRA's work, and understand how much you will need to retire and your investing plan for getting there.

You don't have to stay with Fidelity to do a rollover of the money from ORP to an IRA -- you can set up your IRA with either Fidelity, a discount broker such as Scottrade, or a full service broker such as Edward Jones. Fidelity would probably cost you the least in fees, a discount broker would give you the most number of funds to pick from (I'm talking thousands here), and a full service broker would be able to look at your overall picture and give you advice on which funds to pick.

"Managing your own money" means different things to different people. Some would say you are managing your own money just by moving into an IRA. Others would insist that you should skip mutual funds altogether and research and buy individual stocks -- given your novice status I would stick with mutual funds for now.

[ren]

Re: Does it makes sense to ask... how am I doing ?

Fidelity has some very nice target retirement funds, if you're worried about fees from buying and selling. I have my 401k in a similar product and it's been good to me.