re: Retirement advice

You should talk with several advisors. They will work up numbers and scenarios for you free of charge to try to get your business and explain what value they offer to you. But you don’t have to decide to go with them.

I did go with an advisor because my wife has no interest in managing money and I want her taken care of if I die. My one regret - not hiring him earlier. I think I could have made some better decisions in the last 5 years or so before I retired. I also wish I had put money in the Roth 401k when that option became available, but I was lazy and just stuck with the regular 401k.

I've been retired for 3 years. Did very well investing by myself and foresee no money issues for what time I may have left. I think you can handle your investments yourself, but you have to read and educate yourself on your financial knowledge. If you're truly a beginner I recommend that you shift most of your 401K into a time sensitive retirement fund. Fidelity Freedom fund 2025 (I'd select 2030 because I have plenty of cash on hand) might be for you if your going to be 65 in 2026. Read about their Freedom Funds and how they work based on your age. These are set it and forget it funds. I was happy with them when market drops hard along with my play money stock investments. The Freedom Funds held their ground or lost little value.

Fidelity has a very good free robo investment system that would work for you. It already knows your Fidelity account information and you can add your Vanguard and other financial data so it will take those into account. The system will ask you a few questions about your financial accounts and other things. It will determine your risk factor and give recommendations for investing.
I also recommend that you sign up for the Fidelity email Viewpoints news letter. A lot of retirement advice is in those emails that you read and eventually information will sink into your hard head. Read, read, read!

Go here and read everything. Start gaming your plans using the pull down "Start your free plan". It's all there, start reading and studying.


I've had Vanguard and Fidelity accounts. Have had Fidelity account for about 35 years. I pushed my work 401k at Vanguard into my self directed IRA at fidelity after I retired. If you don't already have a self directed 401K in Fidelity, I suggest you create one and move everything into a self directed IRA. You may have to wait until you retire from your current company to move funds. Fidelity will do this for you and you don't touch the money so as not to get taxed. Fidelity has many local offices and you or your wife can walk into their office and get eyeball to eyeball if you need to. The Fidelity people in the office can help you with everything and answer any questions, they're nice to work with for beginners. Vanguard just has a handful of offices throughout the country. Fidelity website is also much more user friendly with a lot more options of doing things.

Long winded response I know, but I'm passionate about making money through investments and office real estate. It's not really difficult or mysterious, it just takes some reading and question asking. Over time, I've come to realize how rich people get richer without busting their arse. They just know about these things. If I only knew 30 years ago what I know now.



You have a year to raise your knowledge and confidence, get started and GOOD LUCK!

EDIT: wanted to add... OP, if after the year, you don't feel confident, by all means go talk to a professional financial advisor. Had a friend who is in your exact same situation. She paid about $250.00 and had two visits with a professional retirement manager. She's pretty savvy with respect to investing, but wanted the additional confirmation on her thoughts. She'll be investing on her own after the manager basically told her what she already knew.

The first question you should have to the Financial Advisor is, "Are you a Fiduciary Advisor?" If not you should say nice things and walk out.

Creative Planning- financial planners
Websites- paulmerriman.com