What's the best place to start an IRA?

Here is what is important:

a) Complete online access
b) Low or no yearly fee
c) Variety of investments

I hear Vanguard is good and has great ETFs, I also hear Sharebuilder is good.
I'd like to hear everyone's opinion on these and others.

Thanks.

If you already have an eligible account with Fidelity (my 401a/403b is, don't know what else qualifies) then a Roth (and perhaps other accounts) is fee-free. It may be based on value of holdings, but I'm not sure. Fidelity sure does have a ton of funds, though.

Be careful, vanguard's become a landmine of minimums. And if you want etf's you'll need a brokerage account - don't matter if it's at vanguard or not.


U might try the search button and read up on various brokerages/fund families...

I use firstrade since it's low trade comission ($6.95) and also there's no fees for no load mutual funds and free dividend reinvestment.

If you want indexing and low expense ratio, vanguard is the place to be.

If you want the most diverse variety of funds, fidelity is hard to beat.

If you want to trade stocks, stocktrade,firsttrade,etc are well suited.

Fidelity lowered the expense on their index funds last year to below that of Vanguard funds.

OP need to provide more info to get meaningful answers.
Asset type (stocks vs funds), investment style (index vs active), etc.

My general recommendation is a discount brokerage like Ameritrade if you want to invest on your own; or Schwab if you need more hand-holding. This way, you can buy index-like ETFs, or individual stocks, or mutual funds. Or you can open an IRA directly with a mutual fund company if you plan to invest a significant chunk of assets in funds from that family. I would recommend Vanguard, Fidelity, Dodge & Cox, etc. You want to avoid load fund families like American. Their funds are great; but are better suited for 401K / 529 or other pooled plans where loads are waived.

Some people would argue Roth IRAs are not well suited for stocks because of the difficulty to claim a loss. I generally don't agree. IRAs are good for active investors. This is especially true in the period right after you initial contribution/conversion, where you have some flexibility to claim a loss through distribution/re-characterization and the potential to amass good returns and avoid capital gains.

Roth IRA Losses

miserly said:manuel said:No problem with vanguard but worth noting that etrade, fidelity and ETFs all have vanguards expenses beat on index funds.

while i agree, many fidelity index funds have high min. (10k+)

Not sure that is the case for Fido Roth IRA, lower minimum may apply.

Tradeking = $4.95

When manuel and timetosave talk...people (should) listen...

you guys remind me of the old EFHutton commercials. I imagine all the 20 somethings on this board with a blank stare.

Price's s&p500 funds has a 35 bps and says $2.50 quarterly for <10K in that fund. No solution for small investors who like index funds there.