Check out some of the titles on the reading list at Bobbrinker.com.

Bob Brinker's Land of Critical Mass : bobbrinker.com Marketimer © Moneytalk Bob Brinker

One to start with is ‘Common Sense on Mutual Funds’ by John Bogle. Of course your local library likely has them too.

 

+1000 on the Bogleheads

PRAP has total Stock market Index fund managed by Vanguard for slightly more than 1/100th of one percent.

Basically free.

If you want a good book to read, highly recommend "A random walk down Wall Street. Makes the case for passive investing and avoiding market timing gurus and other advisers.

PRAP also has FREE guided choice advice within the PRAP. Either go with existing PRAP assets, or add other investments, SS, PBGC, A plan, or spousal assets to get better picture. Look under advice within PRAP.

As previously stated, Schwab will give you free financial check up and work with you if you mention you are an ALPA pilot.

Lots of free information before you sign up with an adviser and start paying 1% as a fee. With average PRAP balance, it's a lot of money!

 

Until you're maxing out pre-tax into RAPEQIN, you're spinning your wheels.

Hit it hard. Hit it early. The rest will follow.

 

You’re better off opening a PCRA with Schwab. None of the PRAP index funds pay a dividend.

 

I have 80% in individual stocks in the PCRA, 20% in the managed bond fund. I subscribe to Market Pass over at the Motley Fool. Schwab says I've done 10.5% annual since 2004. 1.6 in the kitty, 15 years to go. It's working for me. So far.

 

^^^
Um, what?

There are many reasons to use the PCRA, the but this is not one of them.

From the PRAP funds disclosure:So yeah, you are not seeing a dividend on the statement but you sure are receiving the proceeds of those dividends.

 

Your post made me log on to my Schwab PRAP account for the first time in a long time. I just dump money into the account and don't think about it. I chose to put everything into the Large Cap Capital Equity Fund a while ago and haven't bothered changing it. I'll look at getting more conservative when I start worrying about the economy - right now, the economy appears to be caliente so I'm not going to get conservative yet.

Anyway, Schwab says I'm up 18.94% year to date. (I maxed out my PRAP by the end of March, including post tax contributions; the 18.94% number doesn't double count my contributions). That's good enough for me doing nothing.

 

Just my two cents...

Consider investing in a spread of low expense total market index funds that match your risk level (time to retirement). If you'd like a good idea of a portfolio go to Vanguard's website and look up the target date retirement fund that matches your retirement timeframe. The funds within each are all total market indexes and you can simply mimic it in your 401k. Rebalance once a year and you're good to go.

My only other bit of advice is to just simply stay away from wealth management and financial advisor services. Nearly all of them are simply a ripoff and none of them are in it for your benefit. They aren't fiduciaries. They can't predict the market. They aren't going to beat a decent passively managed low cost index fund portfolio. They simply put you in multiple actively managed high load funds that yield them commissions, charge you a minimum of 1% off your earnings, and add additional fees. If you want a completely hands-off approach then it's an option, but you'll pay dearly for it.

Some good places to get started for information:

https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfin...ement_accounts

http://www.bogleheads.org

http://mymoneyblog.com

 

If you want to get a little in the weeds Google Paul Merriman’s Ultimate Buy and Hold strategy. That’s what I use. After initial setup and purchase of ETFs or funds all I do is rebalance a few times a year. This strategy, over the past many years, raises returns over S&P and Total Stock Market returns with a very low increase in risk.

 

This I gotta see. You're claiming this "strategy" consistently beats the returns of the S&P and the MSCI total stock market index over time?

Sounds like someone selling a book or system based on their 20/20 hindsight of what "would have worked".