Is It Possible To Invest In Vanguard Through Fidelity?

[profinGA 0]

My university offers a 401(a) plan that has a match. Because it is not a 401(k) it is not subject to the IRS maximum, and I am only allowed to put here enough to capture the match.

They also offer a 403(b) and a 457(b) but there's no match there.

The vendors are Fidelity, TIAA-CREF, and VALIC,.

 

I have a TIAA-CREF Target Date fund.

Vendors, Target Date Funds, and Expenses according to Morningstar:

- TIAA-CREF's Lifecycle 2040 (TCOIX) 0.44% Expenses according to Morningstar

- Fidelity: I called Fidelity last month, and what they have available for employees at my university is the FFKFX fund which has a 0.67% expense ratio.

- Valic offers this one: American Funds 2040 Target Date Fund (RDGTX), 0.79% expenses

My question:

If I could get Vanguard, the expenses would be 0.16%.

Is there a way to get a lower expense ratio though Fidelity, for example buy buying Fidelity funds?

I found this article but it's from 2008, and I was wondering if this is still a possibility:

https://assetbuilder.com/knowledge-center/articles/scott-burns/three_ways_to_have_vanguard_at_fidelity

What is the downside? I would probably would have to manually re-balance the portfolio but., is there something else I need to consider?

Susana

 

[krow36 0]

Fidelity has 2 different series of Target Retirement funds, one (Freedom) uses actively managed funds and the other (Freedom Index) uses index funds and has a significantly lower expense ratios. FFKFX is in the former series.

 

Does your plan offer the Fidelity Index funds like TSM, TISM and TBM? If it does, you can certainly put together the equivalent funds using only a few low-cost index funds. The Chuck Burns article you linked is from 2008 and Fidelity has lowered those index fund ERs significantly (thanks to trying to compete with Vanguard). The only downside of doing it yourself is that you will do the rebalancing yourself. Not a big deal in my opinion, and if that's not a big deal for you, then go for it. You'll get lower expenses and that adds up over the years.