Mutual Fund Broker Fees: A Beginner's Guide to Investing
Are you considering investing in a mutual fund but are concerned about fees?
Don't pay for help choosing a mutual fund if you don't need it.
If you think you'll need help or advice, you can choose from several fee structures.
This study will show you what fees to consider when picking a mutual fund.
Investing in Your First Mutual Fund
Before you dive into your first investment in a mutual fund, there is plenty of planning to do.
For most people, investing should be approached with a long-term perspective because $1,000 now can become $10,000 when it comes time to retire.
Not taking the time to plan your investments could mean a smaller nest egg.
Building a mock portfolio with the investments you are considering is an excellent way to begin understanding how asset allocation, fees, and expense ratios will impact your investing approach.
With a rough idea of the mutual funds that will go into your portfolio, you can begin researching the various fund companies and brokerages through which you can buy shares of these mutual funds.
It is essential to record the trading costs for the various fund investments that you expect to make.
Unsurprisingly, it would be best if you considered the fund companies and brokerages yielding the lowest long-term costs.
Consider reading up on these companies' reviews, terms, and fees to get a better picture of the all-around service you'll receive as a client.
After that, decide what type of account you will use to invest in mutual funds.
There are regular taxable accounts, retirement accounts, and other savings accounts that will do the job.
Once these steps are taken, you are ready to invest in a mutual fund.
Load vs. No-load
Mutual funds fall into two broad categories: load and no-load.
A "load" is a sales charge paid to a broker.
Loads can be as high as 8 percent of the amount you invest and typically fall between 4 and 6 percent.
"No-load" means there's no sales charge.
You should buy a load fund if you need professional advice to pick the correct fund.
If you don't need the advice, there are plenty of no-load funds from which to choose.
In addition, every mutual fund, whether load or no-load, charges annual fees, which must be shown as Expense Ratios in a prospectus, like these from Vanguard, or a fund fact sheet, like these from Nuveen.
Unfortunately, funds with low or no sales load tend to have higher ongoing expense ratios, so you must look at a fund's sales load and expense ratio to assess the cost entirely.
The two most significant components of an Expense Ratio are:
- Investment management fees are paid to the professionals deciding what securities and when to buy and sell.
- 12b-1 fees, which you pay for the fund to recoup its marketing, advertising, and distribution costs, are typically paid as additional compensation to your broker.
Choose a No-Load Fund if You Don't Need Advice
Because they're the DIY version of mutual funds, no-load funds are generally less costly than load funds.
This doesn't mean there are no fees when you buy or sell shares.
These funds don't charge a "sales load," but they can still charge purchase, redemption (selling), and account fees -- essentially just horses of a different color.
By regulation, funds that charge these other-named fees can mislabel themselves as "no-load" as long as specific other fees (in particular, 12b-1 fees or shareholder service fees) don't exceed 0.25 percent.
By the way, those 12b-1 fees are paid quarterly to a broker, whether it's your specific broker or the brokerage firm where you have your account.
If, for example, the 12b-1 fee is the usual 0.25 percent, and your fund shares are worth $2,000 on July 1st, the broker would get $1.25.
If, on October 1st, the shares are then worth $2,500, the broker would get another $1.50.
Choose a Load Fund if You Want Investment Advice
If you want the advice of a broker/financial advisor, you should choose a load fund.
Load funds are offered in different versions, called "share classes." The three standard classes are A Shares, B Shares, and C Shares.
Different share classes produce different results.
For example, the share class you choose determines how much and when your broker will be compensated.
- With A Shares, your broker is paid the sales charge up-front.
- With B Shares, s/he's paid the sales charge when you sell the shares, at an amount that decreases annually until after the sixth year when it disappears.
- With C Shares, s/he's paid the sales charge only if you sell the shares within one year.
You choose a share class based on balancing your investment goal and timeline.
If you aim to have all your money working for you immediately, you should buy B Shares or C Shares over A Shares.
- Here's an example of what happens if you buy A Shares:
- You have $1,000 to invest.
- The load is 5.75 percent (the most common charge).
- Your broker will get $57.50.
- You will only invest $943.50.
Your timeline, however, may play a more important role because of the long-term costs.
First, see the table below so you can better understand the reasons why time is so important.
This example uses Fidelity mutual fund's A Shares, B Shares, and C Shares to see how the ongoing expenses differ:
Different Fees with Different Share Classes
| Share Class | Sales Load | Annual mgmt. fee | annual 12b-1fee | Expense Ratio |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | 5.75% | 0.41% | 0.25% | 0.82% |
| B | 5% to 0% | 0.41% | 1.00% | 1.60% |
| C | 1% to 0% | 0.41% | 1.00% | 1.60% |
When You Plan to Sell is Important
If you plan to keep your fund shares for six or more years, consider buying A Shares.
Over the long term, paying lower annual expenses will save you more money than avoiding the sales charge.
B Shares may not be the best choice for either a short or long timeline.
If you sell within six years, you'll pay a sales charge, and you will also pay higher annual expenses than you would pay for A Shares.
After six years, B Share expenses convert to be the same as the A Shares, but the total average annual cost to you will still be higher than for A Shares.
C Shares may be your best choice if you plan to sell the shares after one year but before six years.
This is because the sales charge disappears after one year, so paying higher annual expenses for a few years may still be cheaper than buying A Shares.
Beware, though: C Shares will be the most expensive over the long term because, unlike B Shares, those high annual expenses don't convert to be the same as A Shares. They stay high forever.
How to Calculate What You Pay in Ongoing Fees
The sales charge (the load) is a one-time charge and a percentage of your investment amount.
Calculating the annual Expense Ratio isn't entirely straightforward, although it is just as important.
You find the dollar amount of the expense ratio by calculating it as a percentage of the share price at the end of each quarter-year, then dividing that number by four to get the dollar amount of the quarterly fee.
For example, here's what you would pay for one of Fidelity's fund's A Shares, B Shares, and C Shares at the end of two different quarters (you have to click on the "Fees & Distribution" tab to see the fees for each share class):
comparing expense ratios of share classes
| Date | April 1 | April 1 | July 1 | July 1 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| share price | $13.43 | $13.43 | $15 | $15 |
| share class | A | B & C | A | B & C |
| expense ratio | 0.82% | 1.6% | 0.82% | 1.6% |
| quarterly fee | 5¢ | 10¢ | 6¢ | 11.5¢ |
| total shares | 100 | 100 | 100 | 100 |
| total fee | $5 | $10 | $6 | $11.50 |
Picking the Brokerage Firm
Choosing the right brokerage firm is daunting for investors who are easily overwhelmed by the number of options available.
Investors who open accounts with a particular fund company will often face no transaction fees when they invest in the funds managed by that company.
For example, there is no transaction fee if a Vanguard account holder buys shares of a Vanguard mutual fund. But, a Vanguard accountholder who buys or sells shares of a Fidelity fund will incur a $35 fee.
Therefore, identifying the expected mutual fund investments will determine the brokerage.
Investors who prefer to invest in various funds from different companies may be better off choosing a discount brokerage where mutual fund transaction fees are low.
A Final Word About Fees and Expenses
Every mutual fund comes with an annual cost (expense ratio) deducted from the pool of money invested by investors.
Actively managed funds will carry higher expense ratios as fund managers make more effort to research and select investments that match the fund's strategy.
Index funds tend to have lower expense ratios since fund managers must track a broad market index.
If you want professional help choosing a mutual fund, don't hesitate to select a load fund.
Be careful to choose the suitable share class and the lowest expense ratio for your investment timeline.
Failing to do this could cost you thousands of unnecessary expenses over the long term.
Whether a load or a no-load, any fund with high costs must perform better than a lower-cost fund to generate the same earnings for you.
Even slight differences in fees can translate into significant differences in earnings over time.
For example, if you invest $10,000 in a fund that averages a 10 percent annual return before expenses and the fund's average of 1.5 percent a year, then after 20 years, you would have about $50,000.
But if the fund's expenses average only 0.5 percent, you would have about $61,000. That's a big difference based solely on the amount of fees.
If you'd like to analyze the impact of fees and expenses on your fund investments and look up the prices for different funds, FINRA, the Financial
Industry Regulatory Authority has an excellent tool called the Fund Analyzer.
