How a Crooked Accountant and Pension Planner Led Me to Take Control of My Financial Future

A lonnnng time ago, my financial adviser (my first brokerage account) churned my account. That means that he traded frequently, just for the purpose of generating commissions. In those days, there was no such thing as the low deep discount commissions that we pay today (and no internet). When I eventually figured out what he was doing, I began the process of learning about the financial markets and I have done it myself for 40 years.

Both of my parents saved their money with one of the giants in this field (as tempting as it is, I will not name them). When you visit their offices, there is lots of polished wood, hushed tones, and big conference rooms as they very seriously do their job of turning the assets entrusted to them into more money.

I was executor for both of my parents' estates (they were divorced), so I got an up-close-and-personal look at what the investing company was doing, but only after the fact. My father thought of himself as a savvy investor, so he managed his money himself. He was, in reality, the epitome of the “Poor Dad” and couldn’t find a good investment with a flashlight, a compass, and someone pointing him right at it.

My mother was the polar opposite; she totally trusted this investment company. Over more than 50 years, they both managed their retirement assets this way. While my mother “won” this race because she had more money when she passed, the fact is that if you look at how much money she handed over to them and how little they actually did with it, it’s just sad.

When it was time to unwind her accounts, she was diversified to the point of “diworsification." There was no rhyme or reason for what she was invested in. It was as if the plan was to see if there was a possibility to buy a little bit of everything. She was in every high-load mutual institutional fund you could possibly find, and a smattering of international institutional funds as well. What a mess.

They wanted to hand this over to the heirs as-is and not sell any of it. I insisted they cash all of this mess out and only transfer the money to the heirs. They did this for everything except her IRA, which they transferred as-is. I received $13,000 (give or take) worth of 20 different mutual funds. That’s just nuts.

So, don’t be swayed by the big conference rooms and the fancy offices with their name on the top of the building. These folks are totally in it for themselves, and if they make you some money, it was by accident.

Using the compound interest calculator at investor.gov, a $10,000 initial investment compounded at 7% annually will be worth $149,744 after 40 years; at 6% (representing a fee of 1%), it's worth only $102,857. The 1% fee ate up 32% of the return.