Where to open roth?

[gabbyraja]

Since buying our house this month we will now have a tiny little bit of money to open a ROTH for me (I'm the SAHP, so this has been something we just couldn't afford 'til now). This spring when trying to get started the first time I looked at Fidelity and Schwab and gave up. You can't even start trading with fidelity until you have $1000 and they require monthly minimums to avoid fees... Something similar with schwab. When we first start this I'm going to have about $100 to get started and like $20/month... I know it's piddly, but it's something and it's all the budget will allow for just a little longer.

 

So, knowing my financial limitations, do you have any recommendations for me?

[Kevin20]

You can certainly open an IRA at Scottrade with no minimum, and then add any increment you want to your balance.

http://www.scottrade.com/investment-products/ira.html

 

Some people prefer mutual fund companies, but I prefer to do investing at a discount broker like Scottrade. You can buy from a range of no-load, no-transaction fee mutual funds. What these discount brokers do is have one group of no-load, no-commission funds; some other group of no-load funds but you're charged a commission; and then some group of loaded funds. So you just look for what you're interested in.

 

And then of course you can also buy ETF shares or actual stocks whenever you might want to do that.

 

I do in fact have a Roth IRA account there. Not the greatest website design compared to some, but it's manageable. Once the account is open, you can link it to your checking account so as to initiate electronic money transfers, so that's nice way to fund the account.

[Baddies4Breakfast]

I started my IRA at my local CU as a boring savings account IRA. When it reached $4000 to max it out for that year, I did a direct transfer to Vanguard where I am today. Most banks and CUs have savings account and CD IRAs. ING Direct has one you can open with $1.

Edited July 26, 2012 by Baddies4Breakfast

[hegemony]

I like Fidelty. I have a scottrade account but rarely use it as the platform is not that great for a layperson like me. Vanguard is also great since once you hit 10K in a fund your shares convert to the lower fee Admiral shares where most MF require 25K or even 100K to get the lower cost shares.

[Baddies4Breakfast]

I like Fidelty. I have a scottrade account but rarely use it as the platform is not that great for a layperson like me. Vanguard is also great since once you hit 10K in a fund your shares convert to the lower fee Admiral shares where most MF require 25K or even 100K to get the lower cost shares.

 

Do they automatically convert Investor class funds to Admiral? I'd been holding off since I didn't know it was automatic.

[hegemony]

I like Fidelty. I have a scottrade account but rarely use it as the platform is not that great for a layperson like me. Vanguard is also great since once you hit 10K in a fund your shares convert to the lower fee Admiral shares where most MF require 25K or even 100K to get the lower cost shares.

 

Do they automatically convert Investor class funds to Admiral? I'd been holding off since I didn't know it was automatic.

 

it is automatic. all your shares will convert to admiral once your balance in a fund is $10,000.00. Even for index funds, the savings is huge.

[XxRaVeNxX]

I opened one at NFCU...only asked a $100 to open it...