Jill on Money: Best no-load fund families, rollovers

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Linda from CT kicked off the show, asking for some tips for managing her $960,000 nest egg. She used to have an advisor, but is ready to plunge into the task herself. Tom also wanted help allocating his wife's rollover account at Fidelity. In both cases, it's important to determine whether or not the portfolio will need to generate income; then taking into account risk tolerance, create an allocation with no load mutual funds.

Sue asked that I recommend fund families, which you all hear me discuss every week. The no-load fund families that keep coming up are: Vanguard, T. Rowe Price, Fidelity and the no-load PIMCO funds. You can also open a discount brokerage account and purchase no-load funds within them. Some of those include: Charles Schwab, TD Ameritrade, E*Trade and Scott Trade. Keep these fund families in mind, if you are considering rollovers or consolidation of old retirement accounts. But, please, please ignore salespeople who encourage you to buy variable annuities inside retirement accounts!

A house purchase is on Baltimore Raven fan Amanda's mind, but given the fact that purchasing the home would drain the family's entire resources, it may be more prudent to wait a year or two. MT is also considering a new house and wants to know whether he should buy the house outright or secure a mortgage and preserve some of their cash. This led to a conversation about cash flow and the concept of biweekly mortgage payments to reduce the term of a loan.

We fielded specific investment questions from Sue in Buffalo (should she sell her Fidelity Canada Fund?); Carrie (should she stay with the FERS system?); David (should he buy savings bonds with a little extra money that he has each month?); Jean (could I suggest some Vanguard funds that would round out her $96K portfolio?); and Lisa (what is the advantage or disadvantage of dollar cost averaging?).

Finally, Tom has a complicated situation with Long Term Care Insurance, which requires a difficult choice.

Here are web sites and resources mentioned in this week's show:

-- Jill's Blog

-- How to Choose a Financial Advisor: 10 Questions

-- NAPFA: National Association of Personal Financial Advisors (fee-only advisors)

-- Best CD Rates

-- E, EE and I Savings Bonds

-- The ABCs of Annuities: 6 Questions to Ask

-- The Pros and Cons of Annuities

-- Immediate Annuity Calculator

-- Annuity salespeople don't like me

-- Social Security: Manage your account online

-- Social Security estimator

-- When to take Social Security?

-- Social Security: File and Suspend

-- Social Security: Double-Dipping

-- Medigap insurance

-- Retirement Calculator

-- Retirement Plan Required Distribution Calculator

-- Long-term Care - US government web site

-- Long term care conundrum

-- Life Expectancy Calculator

-- Life Insurance calculator

-- Financial documents: What to shred, what to keep

-- Estate Planning: the Documents You Need

-- NYT Rent vs. Buy Calculator

-- Re-Fi Calculator

-- Another Re-Fi Calculator

-- Reverse mortgage info via HUD

-- Reverse Mortgages: Don't let the Fonz sell you

-- 529 plan info

-- College Loans: What you need to know

-- Student Loan Consolidation

-- Money As You Grow

-- National Foundation for Credit Counseling

Thanks to everyone who participated and to Mark, the BEST producer in the world. If you have a financial question, there are lots of ways to contact us:

Call 855-411-JILL and we'll schedule time to get you on the show LIVE

Send an email: [e-mail]

Tweet me: @jillonmoney

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