You will want to only look at low cost no-load funds. For a new investor, the best starting place is a fund-of-funds or a balanced fund because you get a lot of diversification. Vanguard and T. Rowe Price retirement funds are very good choices. You can pick one with the asset allocation you want. For a new investor, I suggest one with about 60-70% stocks. Ignore the retirement date and look at the allocations. T. Rowe Price has a $2500 min for non IRA accounts, and Vanguard is $3000. If these are too high, then look at Vanguard Star fund, which has a $1000 min. None of these funds are very tax-efficient, but I'm assuming the new investor is in a low tax bracket.

Paul 

Thanks for your help - good ideas

Laura

Good Morning Paul....

 You might want to have mentioned CEF's [closed-end mutual funds that differ from open-end funds as they are traded like any security during the mktday] as another choice where most CEF's are currently trading at substantial discounts [as much as 25% meaning that we are currently paying $0.75 for $1.00 of value] currently and where they appears to be many choices currently [dependent on the sector of interest]. If picked properly, and the mkt rises, you get a additional boost from the mkt in mktprc [against the NAV]. In addition "MANY" pay distributions dividends every month or Qtr, and with the use of these R72's, give us back our original investment back in the shortest amount of time. The distributions and dividends received gives non-retiree's the added benefit of buying additional CEF's with the money being received [cashflow] and building their portfolio's like mutual funds. Retiree's basically use the cashflow received in retirement....

 Just another option to look at IMHO....

Have a "GREAT" week....

Best Regards/Eddy....

How old is your nephew?  How is he going to react to stocks going down?  What does he think the long term is.  I find the suggestion of 40-50% bonds in a young person's portfolio as putting your risk profile on someone else but then again my negative reaction may just be putting my risk profile to the fore ;~).  Diversification reduces risk but it also reduces return.  Some of this risk aversion is inherent in the individual, maybe even genetic but I think you might want to focus on something a little more risky than a balanced fund depending on where your nephew's head is.  The just consikdering going from stocks on your part to considering a mutual fund is a move to diversification and risk reduction. 

Remember I'm advocating this at a very risky point in our economic cycle; essentially buying when there's blood in the streets, and more to come, is not for the faint of heart.

Roberta

Where do you find the actually NAV values for closed-end funds vs. the market prices? Are they updated daily or weekly?

Thanks!

etfconnect.com will give you NAV and market price and graph them for you.

yahoo will give you market price when you type in the symbol - ABC and the NAV when you surround symbol with X's e.g. XABCX.

Roberta

IMO?

I have been doing similar with my N & N's ...

You didn't mention the age of your Nephew and thus If he is older ( teens + ) why not also include him in educating him on buying Stocks? that is assuming your Experience has been Successfull enough to warrant it..?

As you know.. owning stocks Like WMT, WAG, BrkB and many others have been far more Fruitfull than most Mutual funds. And using Margins, Options even better yet!

( I have owned some for Decades and play with some from the top 5 stocks in some of my funds for short term as well )

Over the Decades, WMT ( Wal mart) from it's Splits and Div's has been Outrageous.. and finding another like it could bear alot more fruit for him than some conservative MFnds.

Not to mention, expanding his knowledge about 'the rest' of the Investing world and not just the narrow side of Mfunds..( Fortunes have been made shorting ETF's and Finance Stocks most Recently )

And I Just read a Story on The Average Top 20% of stocks vs  Top 20% MFunds

ie: Small cap Funds with a 8% apy past 10 yrs vs

Small cap stocks with a 16% Apy past 10 yrs

Mid cap stocks were even better..

For Inst. Funds? Have you ck'd out Scott Burns>

AssetBuilder Inc. - Registered Investment Advisor- Step for Investing

Although he does have a limited amt. of Portfolio's .." only" about 14 of them...LOL

and there is > WMRIX> Wilmington Trust Investment Management Services FAQs

You can get for $2,500 Min. thru Fido and a IRA account, otherwise has a $500k Min. or can go with their Load Fund of WMMRX which is the same fund..but only a $1,000 min. for openers..

and/or for HNW > McSherry Anderson, LLC - Wealth Management

 and/or

set up an account with a low fee firm like

Cumberland Advisors

peter.demirali@cumber.com

has a $250,000 minimum for equity accounts, and $500,000 for a fixed income account.  fee is 50 basis points (1/2 of 1 percent).

hope this helps

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