Tracking investments

**disneysteve** · 09-20-2009, 06:42 AM

I made a spreadsheet on the computer that lists all of our investments and accounts. On AOL, I have my portfolio of stocks and funds programmed in so I can download current values with a couple of clicks. I then paste that list into the spreadsheet and it automatically updates all the totals. The only info I need to enter manually is the balances on our cash accounts (checking, money markets) and the outstanding balance of our mortgage.

**Scanner** · 09-20-2009, 07:46 AM

You know, it may be worth it to just have it all held at a discount brokerage.

I use Charles Schwab and have my checking account, and Roth IRA held there. They have 1000's of mutual funds to choose from, although don't quote me, I think Vanguard may be exluded (but you can buy index funds if that's your poison). I can log on and see a snapshot of my finances, minus housing and debts, which really aren't investments per se.

I know Schwab isn't generally espoused around here because they charge $13 per trade vs. $7 at SCottrade but I don't really trade all that much and it is just worth it to me to pay the extra fee and have everything under one roof.

They alos have exceptions to the "trade execution" when it's a retirement account so you aren't getting hit with a trade fee every month you add to your IRA if you use mutual funds. I forget the details.

**frito833** · 09-20-2009, 08:20 AM

I use Bank of America's "My Portfolio" to keep track of all my investments. Everything is on auto pilot. Easy to read graphs, can track account performance anywhere, account management is a breeze, and the site is very user friendly. Only thing I don't like is the max you can go back is 12 months.

**zetta** · 09-20-2009, 09:51 AM

Originally posted by disneysteve View Post

I made a spreadsheet on the computer that lists all of our investments and accounts. On AOL, I have my portfolio of stocks and funds programmed in so I can download current values with a couple of clicks. I then paste that list into the spreadsheet and it automatically updates all the totals. The only info I need to enter manually is the balances on our cash accounts (checking, money markets) and the outstanding balance of our mortgage.

What columns do you keep on the spreadsheet? Is it just basic stats (fund name, shares, current value, amount invested) or do you also put things like YTD returns? Do you run your funds through x-ray quarterly or just once a year?

**disneysteve** · 09-20-2009, 12:58 PM

I just keep the basic data: name, holdings and value. I also have the current grand total and have that compared to the end of year total from the previous year.

**srblanco7** · 09-20-2009, 04:45 PM

I use a spreadsheet, w/ hyperlinks to each account logon screen. I also monitor the % return annually based on NAV for each fund (typically) and the total $ value of each fund at the end of each previous year for comparison purposes.

For fun, I also include a calculation of future value (of total portfolio) based on 8% ROR.

**Broken Arrow** · 09-21-2009, 04:26 AM

To throw more ideas on the table....

Mint.com might be able to automate it for you.

With Google Finance and Yahoo Finance, you can set up a portfolio that can also help track it.

**zetta** · 09-21-2009, 09:55 AM

I guess my question is not so much HOW to track, but WHAT to track. What are the important numbers I should be watching, and how often?

**Broken Arrow** · 09-21-2009, 11:38 AM

Hmm. Well, what I basically track is market performance, not necessarily my net balance.

For example, I contribute to my 401(k) passively and regularly. However, if I were to only keep track of the end balance, especially if it's automated through something like mint, then the percentage is going to be inaccurately high because it's going to calculate the contribution as part of the performance gain. Not a bad way to look at it when trying to console oneself during this recession but....

To be more accurate, I look at YTD market performance, and for my trading account, when I bought in. All this can be done with the portfolio tracker in Google Finance and Yahoo Finance. They're not particularly sophisticated, but for the price of free, it's basically all I need.

Perhaps I need to do more, I don't know, but if so, I am currently not doing it and am open for suggestions. In the meantime, that's what I do: Enter my transactions in Portfolio tracker (in Google) and have it track it for me. Using this method, you can even monitor your portfolio every 5 seconds or so during the trading day if you feel inclined to do so.

Hope that helps.

**Snodog** · 09-21-2009, 11:58 AM

This is a question for those of you who track your portfolio in some sort of portfolio tracker. Do you have to manually add new contributions or is that somehow automated?

**Broken Arrow** · 09-21-2009, 12:42 PM

For me, I have to do it manually.

But, I should also add that I don't track my 401(k) for example, because it's a passive investment account so I don't want to look at it anyway, and because it would be kind of a pain to want to update every transactions.

However, if you just want to track market performance, you don't need to update transactions anyway. You could set an arbitrary amount and leave it to see how that works out. For example, say you have 90% in a stock fund and 10% in a bond fund, you can enter both transactions in the Portfolio Tracker, but put $90 down for the stock fund, and $10 down for the bond fund, and then track its performance even based on the dollar amount....

If I want to track my net balance for all these accounts, then I would go into something like mint, where all of it can be automated for you.

**MonkeyMama** · 09-21-2009, 01:06 PM

I like yahoo for portfolio tracking.

I also use excel, annually, for simple investment return calculations. ((End balance all investments, minus beginning balance, minus YTD contributions), divided by beginning balance, = YTD return). IT's simplistic, but gives you an idea. I keep track of my annual returns from many years ago, to present.

In yahoo, I just enter my shares of each mutual fund, and FMV, every 12/31. Daily, weekly, monthly, I can see how my investments are doing for the year. They have a very easy to read chart. I do not bother to add in purchases though (though it may be easiest to track returns in that manner. I just haven't done it). Quicken gives me a general idea of return, with current year investments. BUT I don't find it very useful for long-term tracking. & I like how I can look up Yahoo from anywhere. At a glance I see how much my funds are up/down for the day and for the year.

I also have another excel sheet that breaks down my investments by asset allocation. I look at that every 3-6 months, just to make sure my asset allocations don't get too out of whack. I'd say I rebalance twice a year, but find I sometimes do it more or less often.

Overall, I think custom spreadsheets and tools like yahoo & morningstar are pretty good. I personally probably don't have the most streamlined investment tracking. Mine's a work in progress.

**feh** · 09-22-2009, 09:04 AM

Quicken. Set it up to download fund/stock values and retrieve transactions from your accounts. Then you can slice and dice however you want.

**scfr** · 09-23-2009, 07:39 PM

These are numbers I consider important:

- Net Worth vs. Net Worth 1 year ago (I calculate monthly but quarterly is probably plenty)
- Financial Assets (Net Worth minus house & car in my case) vs. where the retirement calculators say I should be (I calculate this a couple times a year but annually is probably plenty)
- Asset Allocation (The pundits say review annually ... I'm not as systematic as I probably should be about this ... I review whenever the mood strikes, which is several times a year)

Tracking investments