Through the blog, a reader wrote to tell me how much he was dissatisfied with Schwab trying to "sell" him with a "wealth management firm" and 0.8% fee for the privilege.
This was my reply:
Yes, I did get "that" note from Schwab.Sounds like you touched a nerve with your Schwab advisor. LOL. He seems to have protested too much.We all have different investment styles and different ways of "interacting" / "approaching" others in all our endeavors in life.People use the "approach" that works for them. At the very high levels, Trump is at one end of the continuum (mostly sue / threaten to sue any and everyone) and the Warren Buffett we see on stage once a year (smile a lot and talk a lot of pablum i.e., over-simplified ideas or information).Or perhaps a better example, Attila the Hun at one end of the continuum and Mahatma Gandhi at the other end.In my daily life as seen by others, I consider myself closer to Mahatma Gandhi. My wife, children, and one granddaughter (not Sophia) probably see me closer to Attila the Hun.We are both on the same page when it comes to "wealth management" fees. I did the math when Schwab introduced a new "wealth management" partner here in the Southlake, TX, area. The "headline" / 30-second elevator speech looked incredibly enticing until one did the math. LOL. I only needed math (and, technically, it was only arithmetic that I used) that I had learned by eighth grade to see what it really cost in "raw" numbers.I am 1000% sure that I could have done much better than I did in life had I had professionals manage my money. To a great extent I did. The following were all controlled by others, generally professionals, and I was only a spectator,which generally came once a year when I paid taxes: military pension; social security (which I don't take); mutual funds; ETFs; Roth IRAs; IRAs; 401(k)s; TSP (perhaps the best thing since sliced bread). I may be forgetting a few but one gets the gist. [By the way, more on investing in another note.]I have so many pet peeves but the biggest pet peeve, when it comes to investing, is being penny-wise and pound-foolish. I go to every monthly Schwab seminar -- they are a local event, not sponsored by their corporate office -- and they are excellent.I listen attentively, and then, as the Mamas and Papas sing, I go my own way. I probably hear only what I want to hear and assume that I am smarter than the Schwab folks and their partners. LOL. My wife, no doubt, has questions whether I am even smarter than she. A bigger LOL.But back to that pet peeve. Folks in the audience seem concerned about beating the S&P 500 by 0.0001 percent (or 0.000001) and yet many of them will be much more greatly affected by things they can't control: vehicular accidents, cancer, old age; and things they can control: marrying the "wrong" person; getting divorced (multiple times); living beyond one's means.I have been in the "education" business my entire life. Except for summer jobs -- which were some of the most difficult things I did in life -- door-to-door sales in a NYC suburb has to be one of the most challenging jobs a college student could have -- I don't think I have ever worked a day in my life; it's all been education and training.I was in school or training, mostly public school, from ages five (kindergarten/summer Bible school) until 29 years of age, and then during my military career went to additional schools, including a one-year correspondence course (or was it two years, I forget) and another in-residence two years at Air War College -- usually offered for one year but I was able to attend two years with full pay for going to school, which included trips to Brazil, to Turkey, to Greece, among several other countries along the way; and even a course at George Washington University in Washington, DC, a highly sought-after course for wanna-be generals and future US presidents. Those military officers who went on to become general officers received even more education, all free of course. And a larger pension.The military itself, that part that most would call "work," was, in fact, all "education and training." And I was often surrounded by some of the best and brightest. I even took Stephen Covey's course (at the taxpayers' expense) seven habits for highly effective people, perhaps one of the best "financial courses," as it were, that I ever took. The Forbes course on financing, I paid for myself.
So, having been in the "education and training" business my entire life, I have a lot of thoughts about "education and training" and have done my best to use what I have learned to pass on to my children and grandchildren. One can lead horses to water but you can't make them drink.But through the blog I hope I'm providing information they can use long after I'm gone. I have an entire blog on "living and investing" that can only be accessed by invitation. It is for the children and grandchildren only and will be accessible only after I die -- it's my memoirs and last will and testament. I assume my executor, who will have access to the site, will use it if necessary to settle disputes (which I hope will be few) between the probate judge and heirs.I have a separate blog that is the basis for the financial course that my son-in-law and I use to educate and train our children and grandchildren now. That is accessible to all now, including the general public if they do a little sleuthing.My dad, perhaps the most successful businessman in my life, taught me only one thing in life when it came to personal finances: to read the financial page of the local newspaper. But that's all I needed to get started. The Williston Herald had about a quarter page devoted to finances and economy and two pages devoted to sports, mostly high school. The Bismarck Tribune had a bit more and during my senior year in high school I had access to the Sunday Minneapolis Tribune. In high school I was exposed to the first two, sometimes three sections of The New York Times (the Sunday edition again) but never the finance pages.Again, I would have done 1000% better had I had a financial advisor all these years, but the best decision, financially, I ever made was joining the military. And the financial aspect of the military was only an incredibly small sliver of how much I enjoyed and gained from the overall experience.I assume you will see this note on the blog someday, somewhere, At this point, it has not been reviewed for content or typographical errors, and my editor, Sophia, has not yet read it.
With regard to your last bit of advice, tongue-in-cheek, one could do worse than invest in Schwab. I don't.Ninety percent of my wealth is managed by others (as noted above) but when I invested on my own, for me, in the 1980s it was the railroads, in the 1990s it was oil companies; in the 2000s it was pretty much letting things ride (I had a nice portfolio); and, now, in the 2020s it's "tech."I seldom sold and either held something forever but didn't add to the position, or kept adding to positions that made sense. In my investment portfolio, I'm always fully invested. I never hold cash -- I've never understood that concept -- except for short periods of time (weeks/months) to build a cash position to buy some specific equity.
