My laziness cost me $5 so far ….
November 19, 2006
When I quit my get-through-college job, I’d only been 21 for long enough to participate in the company’s 401(k) program for about 6 months. Quitting meant that I had to figure out what to do with my thousandish pre-tax dollars that were sitting in that 401(k) because I was not going to cash that out. Hastily, I ran to Wamu, since they’re my primary bank, asked for information that I couldn’t quite puzzle out and signed the paperwork to rollover my money into their Equity Fund (Class A).
Two years later, the account has increased by $150 and will be costing me a fund fee of $15 for 2006. I still don’t know much about the account either.
Now, my slackerism has cost me at least the extra five bucks for the year (compared to Vanguard which has a $10 annual fund fee for most accounts) but I wonder how much it has cost me in terms of performance?
The allocation pie chart tells me that 97.06% of my money is in equities, and 2.94% is in money markets or cash/cash equivalents.
My homework is to figure out what “equities” equivalent Vanguard has (should I check Fidelity as well? I lean towards Vanguard because I’m already using them, but that doesn’t mean that I should keep all my investments with the same company, does it?) and compare the performance over the last two years.
Ok ok, back to making my bread!! It’s a three-day workweek so I have TONS to accomplish before Turkey Day (2.5 if I’m nice to the newbies cause Lil Boss gave me permission to let them take a half day -fully paid!- on Wednesday … if I so desire. Hah!!)
