Charles Schwab is one of the most prominent investing leaders in the market. From investing to advisory services, Charles Schwab is also dominating the field of robo-advising with their Schwab Intelligent Portfolios. The best thing about this robo-advisor is that Charles Schwab has promised not to charge account management fees.
New users can sign up with an account minimum of $5,000 to get started with its automated investing services. Like most robo-advisors, Schwab Intelligent Portfolios will have questions for you to answer to assess your risk tolerance and confidence level making financial decisions.
With Schwab Intelligent Portfolios, you can find internal ETFs from Charles Schwab’s own services, unlike other robo-advisors in the market. This beefs up the fact that Schwab isn’t just an investing platform.
Schwab Intelligent Portfolios Robo-Advisor Information
- Direct Link to Offer
- Account Type: Taxable, Joint, Roth IRA, Traditional IRA, Rollover IRA, Custodial, SEP IRA, SIMPLE IRA, Trusts
- Availability: Nationwide
- Expiration Date: None
- Online Trades: $0 per trade
- Hard Inquiry: Unknown
- Annual Fee: None
- Additional Requirements: None
- Closing Account Fee: None
How Schwab Intelligent Portfolios Works
Begin by completing a 12-question questionnaire that accesses your risk profile, time horizon, and investment objectives.
To open an account with Schwab Intelligent Portfolios, you’ll need to have a minimum of $5,000 to invest. If you have more than $50,000 in taxable investments, you can access their tax-loss harvesting services.
Your portfolio will be made of up to 20 individual ETFs. These include stocks and fixed-income investments. Unlike other robo-advisors, Schwab also includes a few investment allocations that include real estate, precious metals, bank loans, and perhaps master limited partnerships (MLPs). Portfolios also include a cash component based on your investment profile.
In addition, since Charles Schwab has its own line of ETFs, some will be included in your portfolio, along with the funds of other fund families.
Take note that your investments aren’t insured under FDIC. However, Charles Schwab does have SIPC insurance.
How to Earn Your $100 Referral Bonus
- Receive a referral from a Schwab client. If they don’t share their referral code, ask your friend to send it to you.
- Become a Schwab client by opening an eligible account and enrolling in the offer. Once you receive their referral code, click the link if they sent it to you via email or text, or copy the referral code into the Offer/Referral Code field when you open an account. Opening an account with Schwab online usually takes about 10 minutes.
- Receive your $100. Schwab will deposit your bonus award directly into your new account about 30 days after you open it.
Schwab Intelligent Portfolios Features
- No account fees, commissions, or advisory fees. You just need to pay for the net expense ratio, determined by the ETF holdings within the portfolio. These fees range from 0.08%-0.24%.
- Customizable portfolio. Like all robo-advisor services, you will get a tailored portfolio that fits your profile. However, you can easily customize pre-selected choices by choosing up to three ETFs to replace with other investments you prefer.
- Access more than 50 ETFs over 30 alternative classes. Schwab has a great reach from being such a successful company. Some options include emerging markets, stocks, real estate investment trusts, bonds, and commodities.
- Track your objectives. The goal tracker from Schwab Intelligent Portfolios gives you a daily overview of how you are. It tracks against any goals that you may have set. It’ll report on a number of different factors. For example, it’ll show you if you have a more than 50% chance of attaining your goals. If you fall between a 25% – 50% chance of attaining your goals, it’ll flag them as being at risk. Lastly, if you fall under the 25% chance mark, it’ll show you as off-target. The goal tracker will also recommend adjustments, enhancing the likelihood of you attaining your objectives. Examples include, making a one-off contribution, altering your monthly payments, or suggesting you change your risk profile.
Conclusion
Schwab Intelligent Portfolios is Charles Schwab’s fee-free robo-investing service. With the company’s family of financial services and its long history, it’s an excellent all-in-one service.
You can have part of your portfolio professionally managed through Intelligent Portfolios. Plus, you’re free to take advantage of all the other benefits Schwab offers.
Most importantly, Schwab offers highly diversified portfolios that are oriented toward advancing in all types of markets. This is reflected by including fundamental stock allocations, real estate investment trusts, and precious metals.
A slight disadvantage is the relatively high initial investment requirement at $5,000. If you don’t currently see yourself investing with that minimum, you can instead open an account with Betterment (no minimum initial investment requirement) or Wealthfront (requires only $500).
Unfortunately, you only get the benefit of tax-loss harvesting on balances of more than $50,000. Some of its competition, such as Wealthsimple and WiseBanyan, have this feature with no minimum.
See the full list of the best robo-advisors and their respective reviews. In addition, check out our full list of broker bonuses for all other investment options.
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