In September 2019 I left my firm and rolled $41,286 out of a former employer’s 401(k) — seven target-date-plus-large-cap-core funds I’d never chosen, with a blended expense ratio of 0.52% — into a Vanguard rollover IRA holding exactly three funds. This is the ledger.
The allocation
| Fund | Role | Weight | Expense ratio |
|---|---|---|---|
| VTSAX (Total Stock Market) | U.S. equities | 60% | 0.04% |
| VTIAX (Total International) | Non-U.S. equities | 25% | 0.11% |
| VBTLX (Total Bond Market) | Ballast | 15% | 0.03% |
Blended expense ratio: 0.0515%. I rebalance once a year, in the first week of January, by redirecting that year’s contributions rather than selling. Six years in, I have made exactly zero discretionary trades.
The year-by-year, honestly
| Year | Start-of-year balance | End-of-year balance | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | $43,910 | $52,480 | March drawdown peaked at −28%; I bought nothing and sold nothing |
| 2021 | $52,480 | $60,110 | Plus $6,000 contributed |
| 2022 | $60,110 | $58,640 | The year the ledger went backwards |
| 2023 | $58,640 | $69,220 | Plus $6,500 contributed |
| 2024 | $69,220 | $78,950 | Plus $7,000 contributed |
| 2025 | $78,950 | $88,310 | Plus $7,000 contributed |
Total contributed since the rollover: $32,500. Balance on December 31, 2025: $88,310. Market gain net of fees: roughly $14,524 — the 2022 loss included, because pretending it didn’t happen would make the ledger a brochure.
The strategy’s hardest part wasn’t the allocation. It was January 2022, when every instinct said sell, and the plan said do nothing. The plan was right, and it was right without me.
What the 0.52% to 0.05% move bought me
On the 2020–2025 average balance of roughly $63,000, the 0.47-point fee reduction saved about $296 per year — small in any single year, which is precisely why it compounds invisibly. The thirty-year receipt post shows what that exponent does at scale.
What I’d tell the 2019 version of myself
- The allocation was the easy decision — any sane three-fund split would have worked.
- The annual-rebalance-by-contributions rule saved me from selling in 2022, because it never required me to decide anything.
- Keep the statements. Writing this post took one afternoon because six years of PDFs were in one folder. That habit is worth more than the fund picks.
Numbers are as of my December 31, 2025 statement. They’re mine, they’re real, and they include the bad year.