I'm getting a mortgage with Chase/JP Morgan and as a promotion they are offering an 1/8th off the rate for every 3/8th of the mortgage amount for all deposits into new accounts. I just so happen to have a couple 401ks that need rolled over into IRA's. I also have some additional IRA's and brokerage accounts I could roll into one of their accounts. All together, I can probably shave close to 1% of the new mortgage rate if I got aggressive moving everything into accounts with them.

To date I've managed all of my own accounts and have done very well. But the last 15 years seem like they've been easy. I'm thinking of letting somebody else manage at least a portion of it going forward for 2 reasons. A) I think the next decade is going to be tougher than the last 15 years and B) I'll be hard on myself if I manage everything and it doesn't perform well.

My question is mainly for anybody who has experience with them (but I welcome all opinions), are their investing platforms any good and will their advisor services be worth the 1% fee? I could probably knock this mortgage down to 5.0% or so, which seems pretty solid given the times we're in. But I don't want to throw the kitchen sink at it if their services are poor.

I moved all of my stuff over and the service has been very good. They have different tiers depending on how much you have with them, 150K, 750K, and then a private bank for the big boys.

I haven't used their advisors except to chat with them occasionally when they call me to try and take over the account. They've been pleasant and generally helpful. They also have a robo advisor option which is cheaper. They don't bother me too often.

You can still manage all of your assets in self-directed, though it sounds like you want some help. If you're getting a decent discount on the mortgage, I guess you could consider any fees (robo or otherwise) a wash. I will say the checking experience and family planning they did when I do sit down with them (for free) has been good. No complaints. They will run model scenarios for you at no charge if you want.

Also something I appreciated, when I did move large sums of money around, they gave me a call just to check in. I suppose that could be creepy if taken a certain way, but it is also good to know they are watching for oddities.

If you need a mortgage officer contact through them, let me know. I've used the same guy for many houses and the process was smooth, especially for such a large bank. Even when there were appraiser shortages during Covid in my area, they made the timing happen for me.

I will say don't expect them to bend over backwards for you unless you're 10MM+, they are Chase after all. You might still consider finding a fee based advisor outside the bank, if the rate drop isn't valuable enough. I just like having everything in one place and the mortgage helped.

As a retired Merrill FA who ran clients for a fee I will say whether or not you get what you pay for with any firm depends entirely on which advisor you get. The platforms across the spectrums of major firms are not really that different but the service that comes from the team managing your account will make the difference. I can certainly manage my own $ but would rather observe and tweak from time to time. The team running my account also takes care of any banking issues plus they know what to do with everything once I check out, which means my kids know who they are too. That 1% goes down as the account goes up BTW. I know most of the teams at the local ML office I use and there are 3 or 4 I wouldn't let near my stuff, and there are 3-4 that are just as good as the team I'm with.
That's all I've got.

Any tips to identify which teams are good vs bad?

SlickHairandlotsofmoney said:

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Any tips to identify which teams are good vs bad?

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Get on the local office website and each team should have a bio. Find someone with tenure (10 years minimum with the firm), or if you really want good help look for Aggies. You can crosscheck on FinraBrokerCheck and if it were me I'd eliminate anyone with a history of changing firms every 2-3 years. And anyone with a legal history (that is also on BrokerCheck).

Im with the private bank but self manage

I prefer Merrill for web platform but JPM is fine

Worth the mortgage savings imo

Interesting play with the mortgage product. Hadn't seen that before.

What's your opinion on Fidelity's Strategic Advisors management group? I've been using them for 3 years since I retired. Returns and expenses appear to be fair.

The FA we've been using for 15 years left Fidelity at the end of last year and moved to a local firm in Austin. I'd like to follow her but I feel some security with Fidelity.

I don't want to self manage but I hear what you're saying about the management being only as good as the team you have.

Thanks!

Dr T and the Women said:

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Im with the private bank but self manage

I prefer Merrill for web platform but JPM is fine

Worth the mortgage savings imo

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Haha great random user name.

Family money uses private bank as well but someone handling it for us since my dad passed away. They re-organized everything the right way, but went way too tech heavy with me. EDIT: I gained 30% from March to December this year, so I was pretty pumped. I've lost 10% in the last 2 weeks, but thankfully had them cash out about 20% my position in mid Feb in my IRA to buy cheaper later. All in all, we do calls once a year and then additional calls to make moves or take distribution.

Prior to my dad passing, we self managed and used the system quite a bit. Agree on the above that JPM is a decent platform for what you would want to do. They have access to everything.