As I write this its Cyber Monday, the biggest online shopping day of the year. Where to save a few dollars on this item or that has been the focus of many news stories and discussion. While we all like to save money on the things we buy, these savings are “chump change” compared with the savings opportunities available by reducing your expenses on the mutual fund and ETFs in which you invest. Here are 5 tips for reducing your investing costs for mutual funds and ETFs to help grow your investments for retirement, college savings, and other goals.
Index Funds are Not Created Equal
As an example the Dreyfus Mid Cap Index Fund (ticker PESPX) has an expense ratio of 0.50% which is pricey for a core index fund of this type. The Investor Share Class of the Vanguard Mid Cap Index Fund (VIMSX) carries an expense ratio of 0.24% and the SPDR S&P Midcap 400 ETF (MDY) has an expense ratio of 0.25%. An investment of $10,000 in each of these funds made on May 31, 1998 and held until October 31, 2012 would have grown to:
|
Dreyfus Mid Cap Index |
$30,743 |
|
SPDR Midcap |
$31,643 |
|
Vanguard Mid Cap Index |
$31,770 |
The above information is via Morningstar and is based upon the earliest common inception date of the three funds and also assumes reinvestment of dividends and distributions. Note that an investment in one of the lower cost share classes of the Vanguard fund would yield even better results.
ETF Price Wars are a Good Thing
There is a price war happening among several providers initiated by Schwab to offer the lowest cost ETF. Vanguard has jumped on the bandwagon by changing the index provider on many of its funds and ETFs; Blackrock’s ishares unit has also joined in. While I likely would not suggest switching from an already low cost index ETF product because it is not the absolute lowest in cost, I would suggest taking a look at the offerings of the “warring” factions. You should also take any transaction fees into account as well. Schwab and Vanguard allow transaction free trading of their own ETFs, TD and Fidelity offer a menu of transaction free ETFs as well.
Your Financial Advisor May be able to Save You Money
In many cases I am able to invest my client’s money in less expensive share classes of a given mutual fund than they might be able to purchase on their own. As an example PIMco Commodity Real Return as a number of share classes as do most of the PIMco Funds. I am able to invest client dollars in the Institutional Share Class (PCRIX) with its 0.74% expense ratio and typical $1 million minimum. This compares to the no-load D shares (PCRDX) with an expense ratio of 1.19% and a $1,000 minimum initial investment. Often the savings in expense ratios that I can provide to my clients can go a long way in covering a portion of my professional fees.
Ensure that Your Stock Broker or Registered Rep isn’t costing you Money
The flip side of the last point is to make sure that you are not paying more in mutual fund fees just so that your broker or registered rep can make additional fees and commissions. Case in point is if your money is invested in a proprietary mutual fund offered by the rep’s employer. While some of these proprietary funds can be decent, all too often they are under performers that are laden with fees and charges to generate revenue for the broker and their firm.
Read your 401(k) Plan Fee Disclosures
Some plans sold by commissioned reps and producing TPAs (Third-Party Administrators) may contain funds that are not very low cost. Case in point might be a plan with an American Funds fund in the R1, R2, or R3 share classes. This might also be the case with some Fidelity shares classes (typically the Advisor share class), as well as with some T. Rowe Price funds (the Advisor or the R share classes). These shares exist typically to compensate a producer. If you see these or similar share classes for other fund families in your plan it would behoove you to ask the person who administers your plan if it might be possible to move the plan into lower cost funds or fund share classes.
We all like to find a bargain when doing our holiday shopping. If a fraction of the time and effort that people spend on this activity went into analyzing their investment portfolios, the potential cost savings alone would dwarf anything that you might realize from finding a couple of deals this holiday season. These savings are not just one-time in nature, but they “keep on giving.”
Please feel free to contact me with questions about your investments.
Photo credit: Flickr
Sometimes the challenge for some people is to figure the dollar amount of expenses rather than focusing on percentage
Thanks for the comment Ornella and I completely agree.
Good post! Thanks for pointing that out about not all Index funds being equal. I think some just think that because it’s an Index fund then it’s cheap. That’s not always the case as you do have those variations. The variations might seem small, but they can add up over time.
Thanks for the comment John. With all of the press given to index funds people are easily lulled into thinking all index funds/ETFs are created equally. Like anything else in investing and financial planning choosing an appropriate index product takes work, research, and ongoing monitoring.