BETTERMENT SPOTLIGHT
InvestorMint Rating 1 2 3 4 5 5 out of 5 stars	Promo: Up to 1 Year Free Management Management Fee: 0.25% - 0.40% Account Minimum (Betterment Digital): $0 Account Minimum (Betterment Premium): $100,000 Get Started via Betterment secure site

In this Betterment review, you will see how Betterment stands apart from its competitors and why it deserves its perfect rating.

Betterment uses a sophisticated computer algorithm as well as a team of investment managers to manage client funds.

The company manages approximately about $22 billion in assets serving hundreds of thousands of investors, and feedback from Betterment clients is overwhelmingly positive.

From automated investment management to human advice and from retirement tools to smart saving, Betterment is the most complete robo-advisor and is virtually unbeatable on price.

Betterment Review

There are good reasons why over 500,000 people have signed up to Betterment.

While most robo-advisors launch their services with purely digital advice, Betterment has expanded its product offering to include a wide variety of additional features, including tax-loss harvesting, socially responsible investing, goal-based investing, and cutting-edge financial tools and calculators.

Although Betterment has been an industry leader for years, it strengthened its claim as the best robo-advisor when it added human financial experts to its already strong product offering.

With so many bells and whistles, you might expect Betterment to charge hefty fees, but its pricing is highly competitive, ranging from 0.25% to 0.40% depending on what service level you choose.

If you want automated investment management only, the lowest fees are charged however if you want access to human advice, you will pay the higher amount.

https://youtu.be/A-9II-zBq1k

Betterment Promo + Features

Betterment Promo

If you make a deposit within 45 days, you can receive a reward and with a deposit of $250,000+ get up to one year of automated investment management free.

You also get a free investment review to help you assess your current investment approach. Four areas are covered, including:

• Investment accounts
• Tax savings
• Fees
• Risk exposure

Is Betterment Right For You?

Betterment initially offered just a pure robo-advisor service, now called Betterment Digital. Now, Betterment includes Chartered Financial Professionals as part of its Premium offering; this has a higher minimum of $100,000, compared to no minimum for Betterment Digital. 

Fee-conscious, hands-off investors focused on the long-term will find Betterment portfolios to be a great fit.

Unlike traditional financial advisors, who typically charge north of 1% annually, Betterment fees are just 0.25% for its fully automated offering, Betterment Digital.

Customers who value support will find Betterment to be exemplary. Customer service is embedded in the Betterment culture. For example, CEO Jon Stein is known to answer customer phone calls from time to time, thereby setting the example across the firm that customer satisfaction is a top priority.

Betterment CEO Jon Stein

The company serves stock market beginners, savers and non-self-directed investors exceptionally well. The online portal is easy to use and complete with education, financial tools, and retirement calculators.

It’s easy to transfer funds, set financial goals to target retirement objectives and shorter term targets, such as buying a car, and even analyzing outside portfolios to gauge diversification and fee levels.

For clients wishing to save and invest for retirement, but who are not keen on a self-directed approach, Betterment is the de facto standard other robo-advisors aspire to reach.

Betterment portfolios are best for:

• Investors of any wealth level
• Investors focused on the long-term
• Hands-off investors
• Investors who want excellent support
• Retirement investors

RETIREMENT INVESTORS

Betterment doesn’t just serve growth-oriented investors who are a long way from retirement. It also offers a low-risk alternative to the Betterment portfolios that are designed for retirement investors, called the Blackrock Target Income Portfolio Strategy.

The portfolio is made up 100% of bonds with a range of income targets designed to provide steady income with low risk.

The interest earned from bonds is generally taxed as ordinary income, so it is best suited for a retirement portfolio that enjoys deferred tax breaks, like a Betterment IRA.

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Betterment Fees

Betterment fees are tiered based on the customer plan selected:

• 0.25% of assets under management for Betterment Digital, which is a purely automated advisory and tools service.

• 0.40% of assets under management for Betterment Premium, which provides account monitoring by a team of Chartered Financial Professionals and permits unlimited phone calls and email access.

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Reviews Of Betterment Investment Method

How good are Betterment returns? According to the robo-advisor, annual returns are 2.9% better than the average investor.

Betterment Investing Review: The company’s investment philosophy has been influenced by Robert Shiller and Eugene Fama, both Nobel Prize winners.

Betterment offers an automated investing solution designed to counter the risks associated with emotional investing, such as being greedy when markets are buoyant and selling in a panic when markets fall.

Betterment portfolios are designed to generate optimal returns for each level of risk appetite by creating low-fee, diversified portfolios made up of exchange-traded funds from up to 12 asset classes.

Proprietary algorithms are in place to automatically rebalance portfolios if certain positions start to drift and weigh more heavily on the overall portfolio.

BETTERMENT ETF STOCK FUNDS

BETTERMENT BOND FUNDS

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Betterment Tools

Betterment’s stand-out tool is its advanced retirement calculator, RetireGuide. Other valuable tools help you to understand if you are overpaying on fees in your 401k, and help you to invest unused cash.

Retirement Calculator

Betterment provides a retirement calculator called RetireGuide, which calculates how much you need for retirement and whether you are on track to hit your financial goals based on a series of questions you answer.

Retirement goals can be applied to IRA, 401k, and taxable accounts. You can even link external accounts (e.g. bank savings account) to a Betterment Safety Net goal.

Retirement Advice Goals

RetireGuide is not a standalone service. Instead it is integrated to the Goals area so you and your spouse, for example, can project retirement income.

Retirement Goals provides advice on:

• How much to save for retirement each year
• How to spread money across taxable accounts, employer-sponsored plans, and IRAs

If you are not sure how much you should be saving each year and what income you can earn from your savings, the RetireGuide calculator can give you insights on these questions and other common ones, such as how much you can afford to spend in your retirement years annually.

The big idea is that spending and savings rates are compared to assess whether sufficient funds will be amassed by retirement to meet spending needs.

By understanding how much you plan to spend each year in retirement and how much you will earn from social security and other supplemental income sources, a nest-egg estimate can be approximated.

All you need to do is sync your existing bank and financial accounts, and Betterment figures out the rest.

Betterment Smart Deposit

Another nice feature we found as we conducted our Betterment review was Smart Deposit.

When you activate it, this tool automatically calculates how much excess cash you have in your bank account above a certain threshold and sweeps it into your Betterment accounts.

Betterment 401k Analyzer

Betterment allows users to connect third-party accounts, including 401ks, analyze fee-savings and recommends portfolio optimizations.

In our Betterment review, we found it easy to connect to outside accounts so portfolios held elsewhere can be analyzed to identify and improve upon expense ratios and performance returns.

External Account Analyzer

What separates Betterment from most robo-advisors is its external account analyzer.

It’s a cinch to set up alerts when high fees hit your account or you have excess idle cash sitting around.

And you will receive visual financial projections to see what your portfolio would look like if you rolled it over to Betterment.

The bottom line is goal projections factor in external accounts too.

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Socially Responsible Investing

Socially responsible Investing (Betterment SRI portfolios) is available to all Betterment customers to better align their investment dollars with their personal values.

Is Betterment a good way to invest? Increasingly, customers demand robo-advisors invest their dollars in a way that is aligned with their philosophical beliefs.

You may wish to avoid companies that have controversial histories, such as oil spills and data hacks.

Highlights of Betterment SRI portfolios include:

• Tax loss harvesting and tax-coordinated portfolios supported
• No loss of diversification but a 42% increase in social responsibility scores on U.S. large cap assets
• Global diversification, tax optimization and cost controls maintained while orienting investments towards environmental, social, and governance criteria.

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Betterment Flexible Portfolios

If your preferences differ from Betterment advice, you can choose Flexible Portfolios that provide you more control over how you allocate your capital to asset classes. 

Betterment Investing Review: Beyond socially responsible portfolios, Betterment now offers Flexible Portfolios to customers who want to exercise more control over their investing preferences.

You can modify asset class weights within a Betterment portfolio strategy and receive real-time feedback about how those changes affect portfolio diversification and risk.

The standard benefits apply to Flexible Portfolios, including  automatic rebalancing, Tax-loss Harvesting+, Tax Coordination+, and Tax Impact Preview.

The one caveat is you will need to invest $100,000 or more to gain access to Betterment Flexible Portfolios.

Betterment Tax Efficiency

Betterment Tax Strategy: The goal of investing is to put more money in your pocket, and while focusing on gross stock market returns is good, paying attention to how much you get to keep after taxes is important too.

To optimize for tax efficiency, Betterment uses two primary methods: tax-loss harvesting and tax-coordinated portfolios.

Betterment allocates money between taxable and tax-advantaged accounts to optimize for tax consequences.

TAX LOSS HARVESTING

When you have winners in your portfolio that you plan to sell, you can lower your tax bill by selling losers that count against those winners. This practice of counting losers against winners to minimize your tax impact is called tax-loss harvesting.

But if you have sold two positions, is your portfolio still diversified? Maybe not! And that’s why Betterment replaces the sold security with a similar one to ensure that your asset allocation is optimized.

Capital losses can lower your ordinary taxable income by up to $3,000 annually, creating significant savings over time.

Betterment claims that tax-loss harvesting can generate surplus returns of as much as 0.77% annually.

That may not seem like a lot, but over time it translates to an extra $44,692 in portfolio gains in a taxable account.

TAX COORDINATED PORTFOLIOS

How good is Betterment? Boosting after-tax returns in your taxable account via tax-loss harvesting is one thing but how do you minimize the impact of taxes across all your accounts, both retirement and taxable?

That’s where tax-coordinated portfolios come into play.

The idea in a nutshell is to put tax-inefficient assets into tax-efficient accounts and tax-efficient assets into tax-inefficient accounts.

If that sounds like a brainteaser, here is the simple way of thinking about it. A municipal bond already enjoys tax advantages, so Betterment wouldn’t put it into a retirement account, such as an IRA, that already enjoys tax benefits. Instead, the municipal bonds would be placed into a regular taxable account that is less tax-efficient.

Without asset allocation applied to accounts, a portfolio may look something like this:

But with asset allocation, the overall portfolio would look like this:

Betterment claims tax-coordinated portfolios can boost portfolio value by as much 0.48% per year, which translates to as much as 15% over 30 years.

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TaxMin Lot Selling

Betterment has developed a series of rules called TaxMin that automatically apply when a security is sold.

Most brokers use an approach called FIFO (first-in, first-out) that compares when securities are bought and sold but Betterment examines not only the timeline of purchases and sales, but also the cost basis too in order to lower the tax impact of stock or ETF sales.

Betterment strives to generate higher returns after taxes by following a strict order in which lots are sold:

1. Short-term losses
2. Long-term losses
3. Long-term gains
4. Short-term gains

The idea is to exploit all taxable possibilities in one category before moving to the next.

In the example below, Betterment saves a customer $3,883 by using its proprietary TaxMin algorithm versus applying traditional brokerage FIFO rules.

Tax Loss Harvesting For Spouses

If you already have tax loss harvesting turned on in your own account, you can apply it to your spouse’s account too so that your overall portfolios as a couple are managed holistically as one to optimize for taxes.

Betterment Pros and Cons

Betterment has a demonstrated history of success attracting and retaining clients by offering low fees, superb customer support, access to Chartered Financial Professionals, and easy-to-use retirement tools. Although account minimums are high for more personalized service, the fees charged are highly competitive compared to traditional financial advisors.

Where Betterment Shines

Betterment Digital is designed to meet the needs of all sorts of investors, so there is no account minimum – a big advantage. The management fee is 0.25%, which is lower than or equal to the amount charged by competitors.

Best of all, financial advisors are available through in-app messaging, so investors aren’t completely on their own.

As a new customers enjoy promotional pricing on management services. For example, Betterment Premium regularly offers up to one year of free management with a qualifying deposit.

Outside of promotional periods, Betterment Premium clients pay 0.40% for extra features, including unlimited phone access to certified financial planners. There are no annual fees, transfer fees, or closing fees with a Betterment account, which can make a big difference for small investors.

While Betterment does most things quite well, there are a few areas of opportunity. If these are important to you, another provider might better fit your needs.

What You Need To Know

First, Betterment does not offer a tool for direct indexing. On large accounts, direct indexing may offer substantial tax savings. Investors with taxable accounts have reduced ability to isolate opportunities for tax-loss harvesting when they work with Betterment.

Next, some financial advisors disagree with Betterment’s strategy for investing funds intended to cover emergency expenses. They state that emergency funds should not be in an account that could lose principal, and they should be easy to access if needed.

In addition, distributions from investment accounts may incur capital gains taxes, while withdrawals from standard savings accounts do not.

Finally, some former clients have pointed out that moving their assets from Betterment to another firm is unnecessarily difficult. They indicate that the process is inconvenient and time-consuming. This could be an issue if you don’t intend to stick with the service long-term.

Betterment Review: Fees & Minimums

Betterment has competitive fee charges compared to other robo-advisors and substantially lower fees than most traditional personal financial advisors.

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Betterment Account Types

Betterment manages the following accounts and advises on accounts that it will not manage, such as 401ks.

Is Betterment Safe?

Betterment uses bank-level security and offers SIPC protection on each account up to the maximum $500,000.

Betterment Review Summary

A new breed of investment tools has finally leveled the playing field. So-called “robo advisors” make it possible to automate your investment strategy, even if you don’t have millions in your account.

At the top of the list stands Betterment, a top-rated robo-advisor service that offers high-quality financial tools and support at an affordable price.

Should You Choose Betterment?

Betterment serves non-self-directed investors of all wealth levels who are fee-conscious and goal-oriented. In addition to its purely automated investment offering, Betterment Digital, Chartered Financial Professionals are available with higher account minimums for investors seeking more accessibility to experts.

As a top tier roboadvisor, it has lots of tools to support analysis of retirement objectives and provides free syncing with non-Betterment accounts to identify lower fee funds and improved allocation opportunities.

Plus, for customers looking for a little extra handholding, a nice feature Betterment provides is the ability to message licensed financial experts via the Betterment mobile app.

Betterment earns high marks for its focus on tax efficiency through tax-loss harvesting, tax coordinated portfolios, and even optimizing for tax impact across spouse’s portfolios.

The bottom line is if you want an automated investing solution that allows you to be hands-off and is jam-packed with portfolio-return-enhancing features and insightful tools all for a highly competitive cost, Betterment is very hard to beat.

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Free Retirement Guide: Grow Your Wealth Automatically

The article Betterment Review 2021 was originally posted on Investormint

Although the company is best known as a student lender targeting Ivy leaguers and prime borrowers, SoFi now offers Personal Loans, Mortgage Loans, Life Insurance and wealth management.

One reason SoFi has grown so fast is its refreshing transparency when it comes to fees.

As you’ll see in this SoFi Invest review, the same customer-first commitment applies to its investment management products as its lending products.

No management fees and a super low investment minimum are just a few of the perks you can expect.

SoFi Wealth Spotlight

SOFI SPOTLIGHT
InvestorMint Rating 1 2 3 4 5 5 out of 5 stars	Management Fees: 0.0% of assets invested Account Balance Minimum: $100 Invest with SoFi Wealth Today >>

Is SoFi Right For You?

The SoFi Invest service is designed for hands-off investors who want the personal touch offered by traditional financial advisors and the low fees charged by robo-advisors.

When it comes to fees, SoFi beats competitors, such as Betterment, Personal Capital and Wealthfront. That’s because SoFi charges no management fees whatsoever!

No Management Fees

Its no-fee investment management service is just the appetizer of what you can expect at SoFi Wealth.

While rival Wealthfront steadfastly sticks with a robo-advisor solution only, SoFi goes a step further and provides access to live financial advisors, so if you’ve got questions a human can answer them for you.

Live advisors are not commission-based so they are not incentivized to sell you on other products, phew!

But wait, there’s more! (We couldn’t resist saying that!)

Exclusive Rate Discounts On SoFi Loans

Chances are you found out about SoFi Invest because you began as a borrower. And SoFi borrowers enjoy extra perks, including a 0.125% rate discount on loans.

Career & Salary Guidance

With its combination of no management fees and high service, SoFi takes direct aim at established robo-advisor competitors.

For example, Personal Capital has higher fees for a similar level of service.

And Betterment, which introduced its premium service connecting clients to live advisors, also charges higher fees than SoFi.

But the perks don’t stop there for SoFi Wealth clients, who also enjoy salary guidance and career guidance free of charge. SoFi values that promo bonus at $795.

Free Access to SoFi Events

One of the best parts of SoFi is its community. The company has fostered one of the most active Facebook groups of any financial company. It’s engaging, vibrant, and helpful.

Its online community extends offline too. You qualify to attend any one of 200+ events that are available to SoFi members.

SoFi is best for:

• Existing SoFi borrowers
• Hands-off investors
• Fee-conscious investors
• Investors who want access to human advisors

SoFi Management Fees

SoFi fees has among the most competitive fee schedules of all technology powered advisors; 0.00% of assets invested.

• Management Fees: 0.00% of assets under management

SoFi imposes a $100 account balance minimum.

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How Does SoFi Wealth Invest Client Money?

SoFi has an experienced investment committee, including Chief Economist, Michael Dooley, and former CEO of KKR Financial, Nino Fanlo.

SoFi uses Modern Portfolio Theory to spread investments over many asset classes, business sectors, industries, and countries to statistically optimize the mix of stocks, and bonds, as well as real estate and precious metals, such as gold.

Uses Low-Cost Exchange Traded Funds

SoFi offers a wide range of low-cost exchange-traded funds to investors.

It tracks more than 20 indexes and offers a number of different types of investment vehicles in order to keep portfolios balanced.

Investments are Diversified

Not only are investments low-cost, but they are also diversified.

SoFi offers a mix of investment vehicles including both US and international stocks, real estate, and high-yield and Treasury bonds.

SoFi also offers exposure to specific countries and regions for investors who have an interest in putting their money to work in a specific part of the world.

Portfolios Are Automatically Rebalanced

SoFi offers automatic portfolio rebalancing.

Whenever there is a change in your account (e.g. you make a deposit or withdrawal), SoFi checks your balance against your target allocation and rebalances accordingly.

It also monitors your portfolio daily and rebalances as needed to get you within 5 percentage points of your target allocation.

SoFi Human Advisors

In addition to these automatic features, SoFi offers human advisors that you can speak to from 10:30 AM to 11 PM EST on weekdays about your portfolio and your investment goals.

Unlike many companies, SoFi offers portfolio management completely for free, and investors who contribute more than $20/month are entitled to member bonuses such as free career coaching.

Lacks Tax Loss Harvesting

SoFi is planning on adding tax loss harvesting later in 2019, but for now this is not a feature it offers. This means you could lose extra money at tax time, and if you invest withSoFi you should realize this is one area where it currently comes up short.

Note: SoFi avoids conflict of interest by not receiving compensation for selecting certain funds or families of funds, meaning that funds are selected based on merits alone.

>> Compare SoFi Vs Betterment

SoFi Wealth Tools

SoFi applies a goal-based approach to wealth management.

Based on age, income and investable assets, SoFi recommends an investment portfolio to achieve investment goals that it maps out.

Clients can adjust their own level of risk tolerance to update selections.

A risk simulator in SoFi’s goal planner helps assess risk and probability of reaching set retirement goals.

Savings adjustments that increase timeline to retirement and amounts deposited will reflect on the probability of reaching retirement goals.

SoFi Wealth Pros and Cons

SoFi offers a wealth management solution with a highly competitive fee structure, combining a personal touch with technology powered investment methods.  

Plus, it has perhaps the best customer experience of any financial institution having fostered a true community feel, regular offline social meet-ups, educational events and much more.

SoFi Wealth Fees & Minimums

SoFi has the lowest fees we found among both robo-advisor firms and traditional personal financial advisors.

SoFi Wealth Accounts

SoFi supports individual accounts, Roth IRA, Traditional IRA and SEP IRA accounts.

SoFi Invest Review Summary

Among leading robo-advisors, SoFi stands out from the crowd.

While some robo-advisors offer technology-based investment management run by computer algorithms alone, SoFi connects clients to live advisors if they want human advice too.

Where SoFi Wealth shines brightest is its lack of management fees. Zero is hard to beat, and rivals who have seen SoFi build a hugely popular lending services in years gone by will likely be worried that customers will flock to the “new kid on the robo-advisor block”.

It’s not just fee-savvy investors who will be attracted to SoFi but any borrowers who enjoy exclusive rate discounts.

So too will clients who are job-hunting find the salary and career guidance valuable. If you’re looking to network with like-minded individuals the offline SoFi meet-ups are available too.

Or if you lack the time to hit the events locally, SoFi’s invite-only online Facebook group goes way beyond what most companies offer in terms of support and responsiveness.

The bottom line is SoFi Wealth is much more than an investment management service at a great price. It’s a portal that connects clients to the exclusive SoFi community which has perks galore.

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SoFi FAQ

Is SoFi legit?

SoFi began by serving prime borrowers from Ivy League and top tier colleges like Stanford, Harvard, and University of Pennsylvania.

The company aims to serve “HENRYs”, which are defined as High Earners Not Rich Yet.

With its wealth management solution, SoFi manages money for customers who often begin as borrowers and now have progressed in their careers to build sufficient assets to invest.

By doing so, SoFi partners with its clients throughout their entire financial life-cycle, from students in debt to equity-rich executives.

The article SoFi Invest Review 2020 – Free Portfolio Management was originally posted on Investormint

Vanguard is best known as the largest mutual fund manager and second largest ETF provider in the world with over $3 trillion of assets under management. Low expense ratios are a hallmark of Vanguard, which is why many robo-advisors rely on Vanguard’s funds when constructing portfolios.

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services can be thought of as the robo-advisor arm of Vanguard, though in reality it is much more. Live financial advisors are accessible to clients with over $50,000 and dedicated financial advisors are assigned to investors with more than $500,000 – an amount that can be spread across multiple accounts. By combining live advisors with a technology-powered robo-advisory service, Vanguard offers the best of both worlds: human touch and advanced technology.

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services Spotlight

VANGUARD PERSONAL ADVISOR SERVICES
InvestorMint Rating 1 2 3 4 5 4.5 out of 5 stars	Management Fee: 0.30% Account Minimum: $50,000 Get Started via Vanguard secure site

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services Customers

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services is best for higher net worth individuals capable of meeting the $50,000 minimum account balance as well as fee-conscious investors who are keen to benefit from the low fees of a robo-advisor yet want access to live advisors too.

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services combines some of the best features of robo-advisors and human financial advisors into a compelling offering for higher net worth investors. With its account balance minimum of $50,000, beginner investors should consider robo-advisory services with lower minimums, such as WiseBanyan or Wealthfront.

Investors with $500,000 or more will be assigned a dedicated financial advisor but clients with investment amounts falling under that threshold get access to a team of advisors, so no single advisor is specifically assigned to any individual investor.

Investors with many account types are supported at Vanguard Personal Advisor Services, a benefit few robo-advisors offer. Many robo-advisors cater to IRA and individual/joint non-retirement accounts only but Vanguard will serve basic account types as well as Trusts and will advise in depth on accounts that it doesn’t directly manage, including 401(k)s and 529 Plans.

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services is best for:

• Fee-conscious investors
• Higher net worth investors
• Hands-off investors
• Investors seeking a more personal touch than a pure robo-advisory service
• Investors with many account types: IRAs, 401(k)s, 529 Plans, qualified and taxable accounts

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services Management Fees

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services charges competitive management fees but, unlike other robo-advisory services, Vanguard also earns revenues from investment expenses of underlying funds as the provider of those funds.

• 0.30% on amounts over $50,000
• No sliding scale on amounts below $5,000,000 (above $5M, 0.20% is charged and 0.10% above $10M).

Most robo-advisory services charge a management fee and pass on the costs of investment expenses, the fees charged by funds, to clients. Vanguard Personal Advisor Services also passes on to clients these investment expenses but essentially gets to ‘double dip’ by earning revenues not just from management fees but also from those investment expenses as the provider of those funds.

Investment expense ratios range from 0.05% to 0.19% which means the gross fees incurred by clients for management and investment expenses combined are between 0.35% and 0.49%. Keep in mind that Vanguard also passes on transaction fees, such as trade commissions, sales charges and loads on mutual funds. These fees are typically small because ETFs and index funds are primarily used but Vanguard does include other, higher-cost funds from time to time and it’s worth noting that most robo-advisors do not pass these costs on to clients.

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Vanguard Personal Advisor Services Investment Method

Vanguard offers a personalized financial planning experienced tailored to the needs of the client whereby portfolios are constructed in partnership with clients.

The Vanguard Personal Advisor Services investment method starts by getting to know you, your unique financial circumstances and your goals. Then a Vanguard financial advisor will create a custom-tailored financial plan in partnership with you. Unlike many other robo-advisory services, Vanguard allows you to be as involved or as hands-off as you wish and works with you to monitor and track your progress towards your goals. Portfolio rebalancing is typically done quarterly, which is less frequent than many robo-advisors who offer daily rebalancing.

The stated goal of Vanguard Personal Advisor Services is to build portfolios with low cost funds, serve as a client’s investing coach and minimize taxes. When it comes to taxes, Vanguard Personal Advisor Services falls somewhat short of the mark compared to other robo-advisory services. Vanguard does optimize for taxes by placing tax-efficient investments in non-qualified, taxable accounts and investments with tax consequences into qualified, retirement accounts that shield the tax impact. However, Vanguard does not offer an automated, one-size fits all tax-loss harvesting service as other robo-advisors do. Clients looking for daily tax-loss harvesting would be better served elsewhere, such as at Wealthfront.

Portfolio compositions at Vanguard typically include municipal bonds, domestic and international stock market index funds, international bond market index funds, tax-exempt funds, long-term funds, and intermediate-term funds.

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services Tools

Some robo-advisors, such as Personal Capital, offer extensive personal finance tools, similar to Mint.com, that are accessible via a mobile app linking bank, investment and credit card accounts to provide a holistic financial view but Vanguard Personal Advisor Services is more restricted in the scope of tools offered, which primarily focus on retirement goal setting.

Vanguard employs what it calls the Vanguard Capital Markets Model to forecast returns. This is a proprietary, financial simulation tool developed by the Vanguard Investment Strategy Group to apply statistical analysis of historical data, including interest rates and inflation, for global equities, commodities, and fixed income in order to produce expected long-term returns.

Clients can work with financial advisors to set retirement goals and work towards them in partnership with an advisor, so that portfolio investment selections are not simply left to the discretion of a technology-powered robot as is the case with some pure robo-advisory firms.

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services Pros and Cons

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services offers comprehensive, low-fee management of a broad range of accounts and include a personal touch not typically associated with robo-advisory firms. Drawbacks of Vanguard’s offering are primarily related to the high initial hurdle of $50,000 to get started.

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services Fees & Minimums

Vanguard doesn’t offer much of a sliding scale in terms of lower fees as account balances increase; only above $5M does the first break in management fees come but the 0.30% basic rate is highly competitive when factoring in accessibility clients have to live advisors.

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services Accounts

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services offers comprehensive management, including extensive advisory services on accounts that are not supported, such as 401(k)s and 529 Plans.

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services Tax Strategy

Automatic tax-loss harvesting is not a featured offered by Vanguard but rather it’s provided on a client-by-client basis.

Vanguard Personal Advisor Services Summary

For investors who can overcome Vanguard’s $50,000 account minimum, low fees, comprehensive management, accessibility to live advisors, tailored portfolio solutions and low investment expenses await them. Compared to other robo-advisors, Vanguard Personal Advisor Services offers one of the most competitive fee schedules, particularly when factoring in accessibility clients have to a team of financial advisors.

And for even higher net worth clients willing to pony up an investment amount of $500,000, Vanguard offers an even more personalized experience with a dedicated financial advisor.

Open a Vanguard Personal Advisor Services Account

The article Vanguard Personal Advisor Services Review 2020 was originally posted on Investormint