I recently resigned from a full-time position where I saved for retirement via a 401(k). I'm now self-employed, but I want to make sure my retirement plan stays on track.
I spoke with an investment advisor at my bank about rolling my 401(k) account into an IRA. I want to be able to see my IRA performance along with my other bank balances and I want to be able to easily contribute to it, so using my bank seems like a good approach to me.
Right now, my money is just in a target-date fund. The bank suggested investing in mutual funds. They mentioned some funds as options, but all of them had either a 3% up-front load (paid only when money is contributed) or a smaller, annual load.
Both of these options sounded, ah, suboptimal to me. When I mentioned that, the banker explained that a load is an industry standard and that it's how mutual funds make their money.
Is he right? Is this one of the perks of an employee 401(k) - i.e. you pay no load - and I'll need to get used to paying more fees on my retirement investments? Or should I look elsewhere?
Thanks!