Are Academic Advisors Always Right?

If you have limited knowledge about investing and allocating your assets intelligently, it can be all-to-easy to place absolute faith and trust in your financial advisor, which is without a doubt one of the dumbest things that you can do. After all, financial advisors feed their family, pay their mortgage, and buy their cars with the fees they make by charging you to invest. And I'm not condemning financial advisors for having to earn a living. But I am saying this--how much money they earn is dependent upon how much money they can eke out of your investments. So you should keep an eye on the amount of money that your advisor charges you--if your advisor is charging you high fees, then you better be earning market-beating returns. If your investment returns lag the general market when you count the fees you are paying your advisor, then you should probably consider switching advisors or putting your money in generic index funds. To get an idea of the types of errors that academics can make with your money, be sure to visit Larry Swedroe's intelligently written article over at Money Watch, link here: http://moneywatch.bnet.com/investing/blog/wise-investing/why-academic-evidence-shouldnt-be-taken-at-face-value/2588/ .