Schwab Intelligent IRA Review 2024: Features, Fees, and More

Best If You Want

The Charles Schwab Intelligent Portfolio is a Schwab robo-advisor offering for automated individual retirement accounts (IRA for short). The Schwab Intelligent Portfolio IRA is a great option for an automated solution with no management fee and customizable portfolios of up to 20 asset classes across stocks, fixed income, real estate, and commodities, including an FDIC-insured cash component. This ensures true diversification tailored to your risk profile. Additionally, tax-loss harvesting is available for accounts with a minimum balance of $50,000, helping to optimize tax efficiency. Schwab Intelligent Portfolios Premium offers comprehensive financial planning and unlimited guidance from a CFA for a one-time planning fee and a monthly subscription fee. This service requires a $25,000 minimum investment

Schwab Intelligent Portfolios Fees

One of the biggest benefits of a Schwab Intelligent Portfolios IRA is that it doesn’t charge a management fee. While it does require a higher account minimum than most, you can rest assured knowing your retirement savings will continue growing without any fee being taken out.

Customers will still pay the expense ratios on investments in their portfolios.

What You Can Invest In

Schwab Intelligent Portfolios offers an impressive 51 ETFs with the option to customize your portfolio based on your answers to an investor’s questionnaire.

Some users might find Schwab’s asset allocation to be too cash-heavy. A minimum of 6% of assets are allocated towards cash. This can be a good thing for the more conservative investor, but others may wish to have assets fully deployed in an investment.

Limitations

A Schwab robo-advisor portfolio doesn’t offer socially responsible asset allocation options. It also requires a higher account minimum of $50,000 for a tax-loss harvesting service.

Account Minimum

A Schwab Intelligent Portfolio IRA requires an account minimum of $5,000 – higher than other automated IRA providers. That said, the larger account minimum does come with some great perks, including no annual management fee, customizable allocation options, and

Schwab also offers Intelligent Portfolios Premium, which starts at a $25,000 account minimum and comes with unlimited guidance from a Certified Financial Planner™. If you’re looking to take advantage of Schwab’s tax-loss harvesting service, that minimum jumps up to $50,000.

Customer Support

A Schwab Intelligent Portfolio comes with live, 24/7 support from US-based professionals. Other robo-advisors may offer online-only or business-hours-only support. Schwab also has physical branches if you’d prefer to get support in person.

If you’re looking to get help from a human financial advisor, you’ll have to upgrade your account to Schwab Intelligent Portfolios Premium.

Account Types

Schwab offers a wide range of retirement accounts (as well as other types of investment accounts). For this article, we’ll focus on Schwab’s retirement offerings.

Traditional IRA

A Schwab traditional IRA will allow you to contribute and grow tax-deferred funds in your retirement account. Traditional IRA contributions are tax-deductible in the year they’re made, but withdrawals in retirement are taxed as regular income.

Roth IRA

A Roth IRA will allow you to invest in Schwab’s digital assets with after-tax funds, which means you’ll owe taxes upfront, but enjoy tax-free income during your retirement. Unlike traditional IRAs, Roth IRAs aren’t subject to required minimum distributions, but they do have income eligibility requirements to be aware of.

SEP IRA

A Simplified Employee Pension (SEP) IRA allows self-employed people and small business owners to maximize retirement funds by contributing on both the employer and employee side. If you qualify for this kind of retirement fund, you can open one at Schwab.

Inherited IRA

If a loved one perishes and leaves behind their IRA to you as a gift, Schwab makes it easy to open the right kind of inherited IRA account you’ll need to roll the funds over and begin managing them.

Other Features

Portfolio Composition

Portfolios are composed of up to 20 asset classes across stocks, fixed income, real estate, and commodities, including an FDIC-insured cash component. This ensures true diversification tailored to your risk profile

Tax Strategy

Tax-loss harvesting is available for accounts with a minimum balance of $50,000, helping to optimize tax efficiency

Advisor Access

Schwab Intelligent Portfolios Premium offers comprehensive financial planning and unlimited guidance from a CFA for a one-time planning fee and a monthly subscription fee. This service requires a $25,000 minimum investment.

Considering a Schwab Intelligent IRA?

A Schwab Intelligent Portfolio account offers one of the best automated IRAs in the market today that doesn’t charge a management fee. With customizable asset allocation options and a wide range of portfolio options, a Schwab robo-advisor IRA can be a great option for those looking for a hands-off approach to retirement.

If you’re looking to fund your new Schwab IRA with a 401(k) rollover, Capitalize can help. We’ve made it our mission to make this process easier for everyone. We can handle the entire process for you. Most of the process can be done online and our rollover experts will guide you through any of the manual parts. Get started with your 401(k) to Schwab IRA rollover in just a few minutes.