Sharebuilder was founded in 1996 as NetStock Direct and purchased by ING Direct in 2007. Their claim to fame is their automatic investment service for buying stock, ING mutual funds (Class O) and ETFs for beginner – novice investors.
What they offer: Sharebuilder is great if you’re a long-term investor and would like to set up and grow a portfolio with automatic investments, like an ESA (Education Savings Account) or IRA (Individual Retirement Account) with weekly, monthly, or yearly investments on a regular basis. It is not ideal for you if you’re a day trader.
Where to join: Open a Sharebuilder account here (use this link to claim a special $50 bonus when you open an account)
Fees:
- $4 automatic investments.
- $9.95 real time trades + $1.25 per options contract.
- There are 2 different account types: Basic and Advantage (See chart for breakdown of fees)
- No fees on some ING mutual funds.
Pros:
- No account minimums, no maintenance or inactivity fees.
- Scheduled for hands-off investments.
- Automatic investments are just $4 per trade, real time trades are $9.95.
Cons:
- Limited trading tools.
- Narrow range of investment products.
The Final Word…
Sharebuilder is OK if you’re just looking to set up and forget an account with automatic investments, but if you’re looking for more tools and flexibility from your broker, I’d recommend signing up with a more well-rounded service like TradeKing, optionsXpress, or OptionsHouse.
Current Sharebuilder Promotion Codes:
See the latest Sharebuilder promotion code offers or follow the banner link below to claim $50!
I’m frustrated with ShareBuilder now.
I can get money into my account and perform trades, but do anything like sell to move the funds back to savings is nearly impossible. I’ve been trying for over 2 weeks and all I get is bunch of error messages. Even when trying to send a simple email contact form.
For the actual trades themselves, while Sharebuilder is slow about it, taking a business day or two, getting them setup to be done is pretty painless.
I’m getting charged fees though on no load mutual funds for transactions when the trades were going in as free trades.
At this point, I can’t recommend Sharebuilder and if I could get my money out in a timely manner would go back to USAA for trading.
I hope Sharebuilder sees this as I’d like to be happy, positive experience customer for them, but I can’t even get a hold of them. Ah, the fun of living overseas out of normal US business hours.
Michael
Posted by Michael Cannon | June 18, 2011, 1:37 amI was considering opening an account with ING’s Sharebuilder until reading your comments.
After considering what you noted, I decided to rethink ING. There is one point that really caught my attention. YOu mentioned returning to USAA. I did not know USAA had a similar program. USAA is a terrific and trustworthy organization; however, I am familiar with their “Self investment” service.
Back to the point. Were you eventually able to recover your fund? More importantly were you ever able to make contact with a human to discuss the error?
Posted by Jay | November 25, 2011, 4:20 pm