Bummed to hear they took out your match at work. I guess it’s better that they play it safe and reserve funds if it means staying in business and keeping everyone employed. Yep, I’ll be watching out for any little gotchya’s along the way with this 401k. From what I can tell all the fees are disclosed and there’s no additional cost for choosing your own funds inside this 401k. Cheers Lanny!

Following the S&P 500 for you was golden. All fees still the same? I assume you’ll be finding that out, as I am sure you’ll be monitoring the account like a hawk! My employer took away matching from COVID and not sure if we’ll go back any time soon. Stinks, I loved that 4% match : )

Keep us up to date with how it goes, looking forward to it.

-Lanny

3 x 401k’s? Can you roll them over into just 1 account? Embrace your crazy – it’s what makes life fun!

Thanks, Joel! I hear you on the rebalancing. I believe some plans will allow you to automatically rebalance your investments if you want, but not all. I can also empathize with the simplicity. My own 401k’s are…not simplistic. When I first started working in a different field than I’m in now (I’m a year or two older than you) I thought I’d diversify by just picking between 8-10 different funds in my company 401k’s. And I have 3! But I am working on paring things down more over time. Even with everything I know now, and a CPA license, I can still rationalize my crazy with the best of them!

Looking back, I probably was told what to do. But I either ignored it or thought I was smarter than whatever advice I got. Now I am playing catch-up! Oh well, better late than never!

Thanks Shaun! Since I’ve already maxed out my ROTH IRA’s, the traditional IRA isn’t an option for me. I could work out a SEP IRA situation, but then i’m limited to a max of 25% of my income (which is quite small). So this 401k, as bland as it is, probably is the best option. At least I get to lower my taxable income this year – I’m planning to do some capital gains harvesting in my taxable accounts which is nice :)

As for calling the HR team to complain… I’m gonna wait until I’ve been employed for at least 2 weeks before I make a scene :) I definitely will bring it up though – I’ll even work overtime to help them evaluate options that are better for all!

Whether people use financial advisors or not, self education is always important. The more we learn and take ownership of our finances the better off we are. I used to find this stuff so confusing (still do haha) but I’m slowly getting better and better. That’s great about VINIX – it’s almost identical!

This is the first time I’ve had Vanguard options inside a 401k. I’m stocked for sure. It could be much worse!

Cheers J! I guess the reason I chose SP500 is because of simplicity. The more I try to piece meal things or build my own portfolio, the more likely I am to screw it up for myself. I was hoping for something I could just set-and-forget. No rebalancing, no doubting myself later, no additional fees.. You’re probably right about more exposure to mid cap and small cap could be good. But since sp500 covers ~75% of the total stock market, I think the performance is close enough to each other. Another thing I could have chosen is the target retirement fund for 2065. It has about 55% VTSAX and 35% total international market. Fees are higher, but I wouldn’t have to rebalance would have access to more stocks.