I think that I made a huge mistake. I opened a Roth IRA with Chase Bank last year.
I paid what I thought was a one time brokerage fee. Today when I stopped by the bank to inquire about contributing to next year I was stunned to learn that I have to pay another 4 point something brokerage fee for 'new money' added. Now, after searching around the net and finding this site I feel that I have made a mistake. Any suggestions? I am a single female in her late 40s and I am a newbie (feel like a bonehead now) to all of this, but what I do know is that I want to have an IRA for my future retirement. I wonder if I should just keep what I have with them and open another IRA with someone else. PLEASE any suggestions or advice would be greatly appreciated!

Yes, you made a bad choice but it's not anything that can't be fixed. You have until April 15, 2013 to make your 2012 contribution so take a deep breath and don't do anything rash. While you can still certainly make your next contribution with another place, it would be a good idea to figure things out first before you make that leap.

And you can transfer your current Roth IRA holdings to another company if you wish, so even your original contribution isn't lost to you. But go figure out what you want to do before you make any moves.

You are most likely being hit with a load. Hopefully, there isn't one on the back end as well.

Call Vanguard, tell them you want to rollover. Pick what fund(s) you want or use a target date fund for now until you find out what you want to do. Roll everything over to them. Make 2012 contribution next year, once the rollover is complete. Tell chase to shove it. Find a credit union, and cut all ties with them. They pissed me off once and I had them stack about $20k nice and high. (Not as bad as wellsfargo when I had over a $100k balance in checking and they pissed me off).

Life is much easier with credit unions, IMO.

For checking and savings, yes. But you have to have your IRA at a discount brokerage.

Since we're taking comments out of context today, you don't have to have your IRA at a discount brokerage.

Just curious. Unless you needed the cash at hand, why would you have $100K in a checking account?

We were in the middle of a relocation.

I wasn't trying to take your comment out of context just so I could disagree with (fun though that may be). Rather, I was clarifying your statement, to point out that (I assumed) you were referring only to a subset of possible account types.

And to clarify my own - no you don't *legally* have to have your IRA at a discount brokerage, but almost any other choice would be a poor one. (Is there any good choice other than a discount brokerage?)

Understood. Just making my snarky point. And I wasn't completely clear to begin with.

As far as anywhere else besides a "discount brokerage," I've been considering moving some funds over to wellsfargo PMA.

I have mentioned we'll be retiring and relocating in a couple of years. I have been looking at checking account options. Let's just say I need a few additional services as well - nothing complicated but all adding little fees. So I have been looking at "premium" checking accounts that might help avoid those fees and reduce overall cost. It's shocking what kind of minimums some banks want you to have now. $20k only gets you to tier II of III and doesn't get a whole lot free. It takes over $70k at one bank I am looking at to get any serious discounts. The balance would earn some tiny interest...and I do plan to keep a year or so expenses in cash...but I just find it crazy to have that much in a checking account. Banks seem to have decided that this is just another way to milk customers that are otherwise avoiding fees.

I had my Roth IRA at T. Rowe Price and I loved their service. There is no up front fees and they have several no load mutual funds to invest in. You have to have a min of $1,000 to start a fund but that's it... and each time you want to add to that fund it's a min of $100.

I'd check them out and their customer support can help you move your chase money over to them.