Do you manage your own retirement money?

DandR

I've always managed my own money, decided where it needed to go, researched the mutual funds or ETFs, or whatever, and I've done fine....about typical of what the market has done as a whole....

So I just recently rolled everything over from two past jobs into one big thing and spent Saturday figuring out where I wanted to put the money to roast for awhile.....DH got all upset 'There are people where I work who do this for a small percentage." and "what makes YOU think you know better than people who do this for a living." etc, etc.  This is the type of job HE does, so I asked him to help me if he wanted to, but he got all mad and said "no." and watched football.

Then yesterday, he said "Sooo...what did you decide on?" so I let him log onto my account and he proceeded to critisize a couple of my picks and recommend something better.

I'm annoyed by the whole thing.  If he didn't want to help, he shouldn't have an opinion the next day....YET--he DOES have more knowledge on these things, so I can't help but listen to what he's saying, which annoys me too!

BUT, my question is---Do you manage your own money? Do you pay someone? What sort of percent are you paying them?  Do you think its worth it to pay someone to not think about it?

JOEBunny

I manage some of our investments.  DH manages the rest.  We have a good mix and different risk tolerances, so it makes for a balanced portfolio. 

DevonPow

We do, but my DH is a CFA (Chartered Financial Analyst) and works in corporate finance, so he obviously knows what he is doing. If he wasn't a financial analyst I would probably use a financial advisor personally, but I certainly don;t think there is anything wrong with doing it yourself if you put the time and research into it. I know that DH opts for more aggressive investments that I would normally do on my own.

ridesbuttons

You will think about if even if you are paying someone to 'handle' it.  And what you spend to have someone handle it might be the difference in a pick here and there.  And many of those people are paid on sales, not performance.  Food for thought.

We handle our own with some suggestions from our accountant.  However, neither one of us has any stomach for risk and we are aiming to retire early (in our 40s).  So that makes things simpler for us.

Not fair to criticize, then decline to help, IMO.

Andrewsgal

No we don't.

Honestly we know what we don't know. DH is an aerospace engineer, and I am a behavior therapist and we have limited knowledge about investments. We are very researched and have read up on a lot of things, but we don't feel like we know enough about the market to really know what to do with all our money. We do understand where our money is and why it is there 100%, but we are happy to have someone who has the knowledge and training to do it.

I am a HUGE money worrier, I need to feel confident in what we are doing and would not feel that way if we were managing it ourselves. We have DH's 401K which he does manage with some imput from our advisor, but we also have IRA and mutal funds through our advisor. That being said we still do what we think is best for our family (like living mortgage free), against the advice of many financial advisors.

AggieCouple

I don't personally, but H does.  He is a big believer in educating himself on something and learning how to do something himself, if the alternative is to hire someone to "manage" something for him.  He is fairly conservative, but when he has a strong enough hunch, he'll follow it and so far, he has been right.  I have been very impressed with his investment decisions, and trust his competence completely, and really believe he has managed it far better than anyone we could have hired to do so for us.

Jodi&Joe

Sure.  I'm not sure, prior to my last job, I SHOULD have been but I did anyway.  At my last job, I was Series 6 licensed, so learned more about it and now feel comfortable making my own investment choices.

My current company uses the same funding group for all of their investments -- you just pick which "bucket" you want to be in (aggressive - conservative (and everything in between)).

WBs_Bride

We do it ourselves, but are seriously considering hiring someone to help out. I am actually trying to figure out what to do right now with a rollover, just like you. I'm more of a mindset to follow general recommendations and it will turn out OK, but my H is more of a worrier. He's the one pushing for us to talk to someone.

joy143dh

No, having a Financial Advisor is one of the best decisions DH has ever made (next to marrying me, of course)    I feel entirely secure with retirement thanks to our guy.  He brought our portfolio up to speed and it is doing a heck of a lot better than when I was trying to do it myself.

veloelle

DH does. he's decently informed on the market. He got burned REALLY bad by a guy at Merrill Lynch like 14 years ago and lumps every financial person in the same bucket. Refuses to ever talk to a FA. FU Merrill Lynch!!  He's usually reasonable, but will not budge on this.