[busque]

Hi I'm the CEO of Guideline. This is a common misconception. It's actually the topic for my next blog post. Target Date funds are just funds of funds. Your paying nearly twice the expense ratio for the same underlying funds. They charge the extra fees because they change the fund allocation for you as you age.

[gmnash]

I am looking forward to this upcoming post about why you decided to avoid target date funds. Specifically I am curious how you calculate that target date funds have nearly twice the expense ratio compared to guideline. VFIFX (https://www.google.com/finance?ei=CWOOUpC2CO-bsgfSRw&q=VFIFX) has an expense ratio of 0.16% while guidelines is 0.13%. Cheaper, yes, but not twice as cheap.

[loeg]

Even in the retail segment, the target date funds don't have "Admiral" options. So you see 0.16% with VFIFX, 0.05% with VTSAX, 0.12% VTIAX, 0.06% VBTLX.

A 3-fund of VTSAX/VTIAX/VBTLX can average around 0.08% for the same underlying asset allocation as VFIFX at 0.16%. That's roughly double.