I'd like to start making more investments throughout the year to maximize earning potential with the goal of long-term financial growth. I've gone through the process of setting up a portfolio on TD Ameritrade, but now I'm running into some concerns.
Each transaction on Ameritrade costs $9.99. If my portfolio consists of 10 funds and I wanted to invest $1,000 each month into my funds, I'll be hit with $99.90 worth of fees every single month, which is almost a 10% loss, per month, before that money even hits the market. That's ridiculous given any return I can expect.
I think my problem is that I'm treating it more like a 401k plan in that I make monthly contributions to any number of funds and the fees are annual, regardless of the number of transaction I perform throughout the year (at least this is how it works for my 401k plan, but I'm not sure if this is an industry standard).
My reason for going with stock trading over a brokerage account is because I wanted to limit the fees I give to the broker. The broker I spoke with, for example, wanted 3% of annual earnings each year, but that's obviously lower than the guaranteed ~10% loss by going with the plan I mentioned above. The other thing I considered was queuing up the transactions and doing them all in bulk every 6-12 months. The problem with this approach is I'll be missing out on earning potentials throughout the year.
At present, I'm very strongly reconsidering the brokerage account, but I wanted to seek advice before I make any moves. I should mention I'm not necessarily interested in day trading (I plan on growing my current portfolio for 10-15 years before slowly starting to lean into lower-risk investments). Any suggestions on this are greatly appreciated.