I Am a Balanced Investor

As you may know from a previous post, I recently changed financial institutions. I had no problem with my previous financial institution but I decided to change everything over to a new institution, including one of my retirement accounts.

To determine if I made a good financial decision I am going to track this retirement account with the new Mutual Funds from my new financial institution.   This retirement account is from a pension plan with my previous employer.  Since I started contributing to this pension plan in 2005 I have made two major changes.  The first change was when I terminated my employment and I transferred the pension plan to my financial institution. The second change is current as I transfer the retirement savings plan from my first institution to the second institution where it is currently held.

I am a Balanced Investor. This means that I prefer to hold a 60/40 asset allocation of investments between growth and fixed income.  I don’t want to take too much risk, but I also do not want too much security.  Because of my age, I should be taking more risk.  However I am a Libra (October 9^th), and this balanced investor profile just supports my Libra zodiac sign quality of never being able to make a solid decision.

Since I am 29 years old, and I have at least another 26 years until I retire, I do want some growth (not too much) in my portfolio.  Therefore, I have invested my entire portfolio in Mutual Funds.  I currently have 62.05% of my portfolio invested in Equity Mutual Funds, and 37.95% invested in Income Mutual Funds.  This is a normal 60/40 split between Equity and Income for a Balanced Investor.

Although my portfolio always holds a 60/40 split between fixed income and growth, the majority asset allocation does vary.  From 2005 until late 2007 I had a majority of growth in my portfolio.  However, in early 2008 I switched the majority to secure fixed income investments such as government bonds and large corporate bonds.  Now in the fall of 2010 I am back to a growth majority in my portfolio.  We will continue to watch my retirement savings account with quarterly updates to see how it performs with my new financial institution.

The book value of investment accounts is based on the total dollar amount invested, plus any reinvested distributions such as interest, dividends, and capital gains.  Unfortunately, I do not have the original book value of this account from when the pension plan was held with my previous employer from January 2005-June 2009.  This information is as of July 2009 when I transferred the account from my previous employer to my previous financial institution.

This is the value of my Retirement Savings Plan as of July 1, 2010 with my previous Financial Institution

Total Market Value: $13,617.51
Total Book Value: $13,560.09

(Photo By ZeeWeez)

Kristina Tahnyak

Tahnya is a Certified Financial Planner and former Investment Advisor turned marketing and communications professional She holds a degree from Concordia University, is debt free and currently works in the field of digital marketing.