# I think the ING Streetwise might be my best option… Anyone investing with it?



## Siwash

After deliberating over this for a while now, I am coming to the conclusion that, despite the higher MER, this might be the best option for me given that:

a) I am new to investing
b) I am investing under $10,000 to begin with
c) it offers simplicity and convenience 
d) I can one day "upgrade" into ETFs and more complex investing

The TD e-Series is what I was considering but with _Streetwise_, you can automatically deposit weekly, bi0weekly, or monthly. It seems very easy to open and it re-balances for you quarterly. I read the report o it from Coach Potato last night, and it sounds appealing and seems to make sense for my wife and I. The returns haven't been much different than the e-Series. One difference is that it tracks the SP TSX 60 instead of the entire index. And it gives you 4 options from ultra conservative (70% bonds 30% equities) to aggressive (100% equities).

I would like to hear from others who have experience with the Streetwise portfolio. Also, would any of you dissuade me for any particular reason for starting out with it? 

Thanks!


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## andrewf

I think the consensus is that Streetwise are a reasonable choice for beginners with small amounts of capital to invest.

Downsides are the fees as you mention (which are on the high side of reasonable), and perhaps being too automatic. It might be hard to overcome inertia once you're invested to make the switch to lower-cost funds.


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## wendi1

Agreed. The important thing is to start saving... and when you two look around in a couple of years for something less expensive, there will be a nice little nest egg to invest.


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## brad

I guess the only caution/uncertainty is that ING is now owned by ScotiaBank (and changing its name to Tangerine later this spring), and while ING has taken pains to ensure its customers that no major changes are in the works it's always possible that ScotiaBank will decide to rock the boat. They could discontinue the program or change the fees, for example. I doubt that'll happen anytime soon, though, since they seem to be moving carefully to avoid losing their existing customer base.


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## tygrus

If you are going to invest just to match inflation or maybe even lose to it, you might as well keep it in your pants. Adjusted inflation is running at 2.5%. I don't buy anything that doesn't have at least a 5% return and pays out a dividend each month so I have some cash flow from it. For steady safe fixed income I hold XTR.


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## chantl01

I think the Streetwise funds are a great place to start out. That's exactly what I did with my TFSA, and it grew nicely until I was ready to move it into a TD Discount Investing account and start buying a combination of TD e-series funds and ETFs. The automatic deposit function is great, although it's a lot less transparent what the process is when you want to cease the automatic deposits.


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## richard

You can also set up automatic transfers with the e-Series funds. They can be configured online. You have to set up a separate one for each fund and there is a minimum. You also have to rebalance yourself. Otherwise the difference is about $60/year in fees so it doesn't matter much.


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## Spudd

tygrus said:


> If you are going to invest just to match inflation or maybe even lose to it, you might as well keep it in your pants. Adjusted inflation is running at 2.5%. I don't buy anything that doesn't have at least a 5% return and pays out a dividend each month so I have some cash flow from it. For steady safe fixed income I hold XTR.


I don't think you know what the Streetwise funds are. They are self-balancing couch potato portfolios of index funds.


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## Four Pillars

Perfect choice!


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## andrewf

tygrus said:


> If you are going to invest just to match inflation or maybe even lose to it, you might as well keep it in your pants. Adjusted inflation is running at 2.5%. I don't buy anything that doesn't have at least a 5% return and pays out a dividend each month so I have some cash flow from it. For steady safe fixed income I hold XTR.


This is comically bad advice. XTR is not safe, steady income. It is an equity fund that can and will have big drawdowns in a market correction.


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## Siwash

tygrus said:


> If you are going to invest just to match inflation or maybe even lose to it, you might as well keep it in your pants. Adjusted inflation is running at 2.5%. I don't buy anything that doesn't have at least a 5% return and pays out a dividend each month so I have some cash flow from it. For steady safe fixed income I hold XTR.


Pardon my ignorance, but isn't XTR an ETF? My understanding is that if you are investing less than $10,000 ETFs are not advisable. The returns, but the way, on the 100% equities over the past 4 years hasn't been too shabby at 15%+. 

Of the four options listed, we might go with the 100% equity portfolio b/c we are teachers and our time horizon is long term (25 years until retirement at least). 

Or, we might go with the equal weighting balance of bonds, Cdn, US, Intl equities (25% each)


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## james4beach

tygrus said:


> For steady safe fixed income I hold XTR.


There is nothing particularly safe about XTR. It holds a lot of junk bonds, for one. Also it's (approximately) equivalent to 83% equity exposure so you should view that as an 83/17 fund.

See some info here
http://canadianmoneyforum.com/showt...-Fund-for-2014?p=214983&viewfull=1#post214983


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## moose

Hi Siwash, 

I have been in 2 of the streetwise funds since ~may 2011 [Balanced Growth (INI230) and Balanced (INI220)]. I must say that I liked them when I started out. At the time the Equity Growth fund didn't exist. I personally believe its a great choice starting out (if the initial account has less then 5,000$ in it). If I were to do it all again, I would probably take the Equity growth fund (its holdings are pretty solid) and Balanced Growth. I think the Balanced Income Fund is the laggard of the group..

To clarify, when you say less then 10k, do you mean you want to build that up over time? If your initial lump investment is ~5.5 or 6K, you can always go to Questrade, you would qualify for a waiver of their inactivity fees, _and _get free ETF purchases, effectively reducing your MER. The caveat being your account needs to maintain a market value of 5k or greater, so if we get a correction after your deposit, you might need to pay some fees.. I would say that anything above 6k is ok for ETF holding if your broker will waive inactivity fee _and _if they offer free ETF purchases. Otherwise, you are right that its better to stick with the streetwise. 

All in all I'm happy with the Streetwise, since it served the purpose I intended to use it for. More and more now, however, I'm on the edge of my seat looking to trade it in for an ETF with similar holdings..

Hope it helps!


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## Siwash

moose said:


> Hi Siwash,
> 
> I have been in 2 of the streetwise funds since ~may 2011 [Balanced Growth (INI230) and Balanced (INI220)]. I must say that I liked them when I started out. At the time the Equity Growth fund didn't exist. I personally believe its a great choice starting out (if the initial account has less then 5,000$ in it). If I were to do it all again, I would probably take the Equity growth fund (its holdings are pretty solid) and Balanced Growth. I think the Balanced Income Fund is the laggard of the group..
> 
> To clarify, when you say less then 10k, do you mean you want to build that up over time? If your initial lump investment is ~5.5 or 6K, you can always go to Questrade, you would qualify for a waiver of their inactivity fees, _and _get free ETF purchases, effectively reducing your MER. The caveat being your account needs to maintain a market value of 5k or greater, so if we get a correction after your deposit, you might need to pay some fees.. I would say that anything above 6k is ok for ETF holding if your broker will waive inactivity fee _and _if they offer free ETF purchases. Otherwise, you are right that its better to stick with the streetwise.
> 
> All in all I'm happy with the Streetwise, since it served the purpose I intended to use it for. More and more now, however, I'm on the edge of my seat looking to trade it in for an ETF with similar holdings..
> 
> Hope it helps!


Hey Moose,

We want to initially invest somewhere around $8000 to $10,000 - probably more like $10,000. Then we'd like to invest monthly or bi-montly, perhaps $500 per month or there abouts... 

Hmm, Questtrade, eh? Not consider up til now… Maybe I should.. So what ETF would you recommend? Would it be equivalent/similar to a Streetwise type portfolio (something that is fairly diversified?)

What specific ETF would you suggest?

Thanks!

P.S. I didn't even occur to me to invest in two separate Streetwise funds… that might be a good option to go with - $5000 in each the of the Equity Growth fund and the Balanced Growth…


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## GoldStone

Siwash said:


> P.S. I didn't even occur to me to invest in two separate Streetwise funds… that might be a good option to go with - $5000 in each the of the Equity Growth fund and the Balanced Growth…


Balanced Growth is plenty aggressive by itself. Only 25% in bonds. Equity Growth is VERY aggressive: 0% in bonds. Doing half and half gives you 12.5% bonds, 87.5% equities. Still VERY aggressive. Be prepared for a bumpy ride.


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## GoldStone

andrewf said:


> tygrus said:
> 
> 
> 
> For steady safe fixed income I hold XTR.
> 
> 
> 
> This is comically bad advice. XTR is not safe, steady income. It is an equity fund that can and will have big drawdowns in a market correction.
Click to expand...

+1

CMF needs a sticky about XTR. It's easily one of the worst, least transparent ETFs on the Canadian market. Yet it regularly comes up on the forum as a "safe" investment.


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## juniperpansy

ING streetwise is fine. I started with them, moved to TD e-series the next year and this year I moved to TDW (mistake! I'll write about it later)
I would recommend just starting out with e-series if possible. Transferrring over from ING took over a month and was a royal pain. They both blamed each other for the mistakes and nobody seemed to know what was going on...

Its very easy to balance using e-series. I wouldn't consider that a issue. Either choice is fine, I would just chose to save the potential headache from switching down the line. As other posters have noted I'm pretty sure e-series does automatic deposits as well


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## moose

Gotta agree here with Goldstone here, there's no denying that this is going via an aggressive route. Consider your time-frame, salary, and employment stability, future need for cash, etc. Given a good back-up plan, that your not going to need the funds for a while, and you wont panic during the next downward move, I think its a good start to investing considering the top 10 holdings are companies most of us here wouldn't mind having a piece of. I think its ok for you to go aggressive now, if you acknowledge that you are going so, if you pick some good Canadian dividend payers up later on when you get some experience, and make yourself a good GIC or even a high interest TFSA in cash. 

Off the top of my head, XIU holds very similar to the Streetwise Equity Growth, but the proportions differ. Balanced Growth (BG) is similar to XIU also, except BG holds Apple as 0.79%. Consult the couch potato website for good ETF options for various goals and explanations where they should be (optimally) held. 

the problem between ETF or Streetwise here then, is simply the difference in MER. (1.07 vs 0.18 % if I'm correct). There are calculators online which can turn these numbers into meaningful yearly costs if you plug in your initial, approximate return, and additional top-ups. I like ING, I have some of my savings accounts with them, but if you plan to invest around 10k initially anyway, I don't think I'd stick with them personally. 

You can hold for sure invest in two separate funds. I'm quite sure that the ING adviser you speak to (for first purchase) will advise you not to however. Like anything, there are pros and cons to splitting funds. With two pools of 5k each, your spiting and lowering the DRIP'ing potential of your investment slightly. Your trading this for a bit more stability with the bonds. In splitting Equity and Balanced Growth, you'll get the bond exposure (as Goldstone wrote), so you'll probably lower your return somewhat, but also lowering your risk too.

Worth noting: the ETF will have a commission on the sell side. ING shouldn't change outright (but I'm sure its taken into consideration as part of the 1.07% MER) for buy/sell.


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## richard

Siwash said:


> We want to initially invest somewhere around $8000 to $10,000 - probably more like $10,000. Then we'd like to invest monthly or bi-montly, perhaps $500 per month or there abouts...


If you use up your annual limit this month, I hope those monthly additions (which are a good idea) don't start until 2015 



moose said:


> Off the top of my head, XIU holds very similar to the Streetwise Equity Growth, but the proportions differ. Balanced Growth (BG) is similar to XIU also, except BG holds Apple as 0.79%. Consult the couch potato website for good ETF options for various goals and explanations where they should be (optimally) held.


XIU is Canadian stocks, which are only 25-50% of the ING funds. ETFs are just like the e-Series funds - you will want more than one. If you combine XIC with VT you would get something similar to the Equity Growth portfolio. For a 4-fund portfolio you could use XIC, VTI, VXUS, and XBB. Both lists require trading in USD which has a lot of hidden fees if you aren't careful.


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## Siwash

richard said:


> If you use up your annual limit this month, I hope those monthly additions (which are a good idea) don't start until 2015
> 
> 
> 
> XIU is Canadian stocks, which are only 25-50% of the ING funds. ETFs are just like the e-Series funds - you will want more than one. If you combine XIC with VT you would get something similar to the Equity Growth portfolio. For a 4-fund portfolio you could use XIC, VTI, VXUS, and XBB. Both lists require trading in USD which has a lot of hidden fees if you aren't careful.


Intriguing but a little intimidating for a rookie, especially when you state, " a lot of hidden fees if you aren't careful "

I googled those tickers… it brings me to i-Shares. 


So with $10K is it worth buying into 4 of the above-mentioned ETFs?


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## heyjude

Siwash said:


> This is the first time I heard that you have to go to a branch. What I've read is that the e-Series can ONLY be purchased online. Correct me if I am wrong.
> 
> thanks


I have a bunch if TD accounts including private banking and I am planning to set up a TFSA with TD Direct. I've been told I will need to visit a branch to set up the TFSA. Once set up, I can do my investing online.


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## Ag Driver

Siwash, as MrPPincer stated, I was talking about initially setting up the account. 

My preference is to do everything online, so I have no issues with the purchase of eseries funds being online only.


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## Siwash

Ag Driver said:


> Siwash, as MrPPincer stated, I was talking about initially setting up the account.
> 
> My preference is to do everything online, so I have no issues with the purchase of eseries funds being online only.


Interesting b/c my understanding is that it can only be done online. My wife banks with TD so I'll inquire at her branch. I've read that the branch reps don't even know what the e-Series is as they are trained to sell their traditional mutual fund products. 

We shall see.


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## Ag Driver

I didn't even mention eseries funds. I just told them what they needed to know -- That I wanted a TD Direct Investing account as a TFSA. The rest is on your own online.


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## Eclectic12

Ag Driver said:


> Siwash said:
> 
> 
> 
> Interesting b/c my understanding is that it can only be done online. My wife banks with TD so I'll inquire at her branch. I've read that the branch reps don't even know what the e-Series is as they are trained to sell their traditional mutual fund products ...
> 
> 
> 
> I didn't even mention eseries funds. I just told them what they needed to know -- That I wanted a TD Direct Investing account as a TFSA. The rest is on your own online.
Click to expand...


http://www.freedomthirtyfiveblog.com/2013/12/how-to-apply-e-series-mutual-funds.html
http://www.freedomthirtyfiveblog.com/2013/12/using-td-e-series-mutual-funds.html
http://www.canadiancapitalist.com/td-e-series-accounts-not-very-hard-to-set-up/

... there were also some threads on CMF last year outlining what I recall was pretty much a similar process.


Cheers


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## Spudd

You went with TDDI, but if you go for a TD investments (banking side, not brokerage side) account, I think it has to be specifically set up for e-series.


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## Siwash

Eclectic12 said:


> http://www.freedomthirtyfiveblog.com/2013/12/how-to-apply-e-series-mutual-funds.html
> http://www.freedomthirtyfiveblog.com/2013/12/using-td-e-series-mutual-funds.html
> http://www.canadiancapitalist.com/td-e-series-accounts-not-very-hard-to-set-up/
> 
> ... there were also some threads on CMF last year outlining what I recall was pretty much a similar process.
> 
> 
> Cheers


I read the comments from the Cdn Capitalist.. many negative experiences… similar to what I read elsewhere..

I found a decent MER calculator site (http://saviifinancial.com/seg-funds/m-e-r-fee-calculator/). And when I punched my number comparing ING and TD, the MER fees over a 5 year investment window were about $650 or about $55 per year… not very significant. I suppose some would consider the conveniences of ING (automatic quarterly portfolio rebalance for example), to be worth the extra small cost.


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## Eclectic12

Siwash said:


> I read the comments from the Cdn Capitalist.. many negative experiences… similar to what I read elsewhere ...


 ... yet CC thought it was smooth plus the last couple of CMF threads that reported said that as long as one was prepared, it was smoother than they though.

IAC ...



Siwash said:


> ... comparing ING and TD, the MER fees over a 5 year investment window were about $650 or about $55 per year… not very significant. I suppose some would consider the conveniences of ING (automatic quarterly portfolio rebalance for example), to be worth the extra small cost.


The key is what are you comfortable with as your the one having to live the results plus any effort to stay up to date.


Cheers


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## favelle75

Siwash said:


> After deliberating over this for a while now, I am coming to the conclusion that, despite the higher MER, this might be the best option for me given that:
> 
> a) I am new to investing
> b) I am investing under $10,000 to begin with
> c) it offers simplicity and convenience
> d) I can one day "upgrade" into ETFs and more complex investing
> 
> The TD e-Series is what I was considering but with _Streetwise_, you can automatically deposit weekly, bi0weekly, or monthly. It seems very easy to open and it re-balances for you quarterly. I read the report o it from Coach Potato last night, and it sounds appealing and seems to make sense for my wife and I. The returns haven't been much different than the e-Series. One difference is that it tracks the SP TSX 60 instead of the entire index. And it gives you 4 options from ultra conservative (70% bonds 30% equities) to aggressive (100% equities).
> 
> I would like to hear from others who have experience with the Streetwise portfolio. Also, would any of you dissuade me for any particular reason for starting out with it?
> 
> Thanks!


I have the bulk of my investments in ETF's with Questrade. But I do hold 10% in ING's Streetwise Balanced Growth account within my TFSA. Its how I started. Yes, the MER is high, but there are literally NO fees with these accounts. So easy to set up and add money to...plus it has some American exposure....I don't think you can go wrong with them.

However, they have climbed pretty high, really fast lately (like a lot of index funds). I'm not one to try and time the market, but good lord, something has to give soon....


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## Siwash

favelle75 said:


> I have the bulk of my investments in ETF's with Questrade. But I do hold 10% in ING's Streetwise Balanced Growth account within my TFSA. Its how I started. Yes, the MER is high, but there are literally NO fees with these accounts. So easy to set up and add money to...plus it has some American exposure....I don't think you can go wrong with them.
> 
> However, they have climbed pretty high, really fast lately (like a lot of index funds). I'm not one to try and time the market, but good lord, something has to give soon....


Thanks for the feedback on ING. Seems like a lot of the other stuff out there have more fees than advertised.. those MERs aren't as low as they appear I guess. One of the other factors that give weight to the ING is you avoid the temptation of not selling/buying when you should not. I don't know how I will react once I see my fund plummet!


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