Getting good returns on your mutual fund might seem like a joke these days. Most mutual funds have pretty poor performance, and there are a few reasons why. Government regulations have a lot to do with it, and the industry has gotten lazy and inefficient. As a result, investors have suffered with returns that barely beat inflation.
You can try to get better returns from your mutual fund, however, don't expect these products to solve all of your retirement problems.
The first step in boosting the returns on your mutual funds is by ignoring the 1, 5, and 10 year historical returns that are posted by the fund company. Most of the time, these numbers are inflated anyway by showing you the simple average as opposed to the effective yield.
Unless you have a scientific calculator, you're probably not going to get too far.
The second step in raising your mutual fund's return may be just to dump the fund. I know that's not really boosting the return of the fund, but you may be better off investing in something else. Actually, that's one of the basic rules of investing: understand what you are investing in. Unless you understand every business that that mutual fund holds, you are asking for trouble. You're not being a smart investor, you're just guessing.
One final point to consider is choosing mutual funds that invest in value stocks or smaller companies. Also, if your fund itself is small, that can be a big plus. If the fees are low, and the fund is small, under the right management you could end up seeing strong growth that will help your portfolio overcome years of lackluster performance. - 16036
You can try to get better returns from your mutual fund, however, don't expect these products to solve all of your retirement problems.
The first step in boosting the returns on your mutual funds is by ignoring the 1, 5, and 10 year historical returns that are posted by the fund company. Most of the time, these numbers are inflated anyway by showing you the simple average as opposed to the effective yield.
Unless you have a scientific calculator, you're probably not going to get too far.
The second step in raising your mutual fund's return may be just to dump the fund. I know that's not really boosting the return of the fund, but you may be better off investing in something else. Actually, that's one of the basic rules of investing: understand what you are investing in. Unless you understand every business that that mutual fund holds, you are asking for trouble. You're not being a smart investor, you're just guessing.
One final point to consider is choosing mutual funds that invest in value stocks or smaller companies. Also, if your fund itself is small, that can be a big plus. If the fees are low, and the fund is small, under the right management you could end up seeing strong growth that will help your portfolio overcome years of lackluster performance. - 16036
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