💸 It’s Only 1%… Right?! 🤯

How much damage can a teeny-tiny 1% fee really do to your investments? Spoiler alert: A LOT. Like, life-changing amounts. 😱

For years, people told us “fees matter,” but we wanted to see it. Feel it. Understand it in our bones (and our bank accounts). So when we stumbled across some dusty old paperwork from one of Katie’s first-ever investments while clearing out our flat, we got curious. 🕵️‍♀️

That first investment? Oh, it was with a very shiny, very expensive London investment firm. Think suits, skyscrapers, and sky-high fees. Later, we switched to a low-cost Vanguard Index Fund and… WOW. The difference was jaw-dropping. Like, “why didn’t anyone teach us this in school?!” kind of shocking. 😤

We wrote a whole article about it (because of course we did): Impact of Fees. 📚

Then, during one of our Rebel Finance School sessions, we got really fired up about fees. Katie got so excited she disappeared for two days and came back with a shiny new tool 🛠️ that shows you exactly how much fees are costing you over time. It’s simple, powerful, and might just blow your mind. 💥

Rebel Ninja Martin has now taken the tool Katie created and built it into this web page for you to use. You can compare the difference in fees over time between any two investments!

🛠️ How to Use the Fee-Slaying Tool of Awesomeness 💥

Ready to see how much your investments are being mugged by fees? Let’s go! 🕶️💼

This magical little tool lets you compare two investment funds or platforms side-by-side. On the left, you pop in your current fund or the one you’re eyeing up. On the right, we’ve pre-loaded the legendary 🏆 Vanguard FTSE Global All Cap Fund — one of our low-cost heroes.

Once you’ve entered your numbers, the tool does its thing and calculates the impact of fees over 30 years (yep, thirty 😲). You can tweak the growth rate if you’re feeling fancy or want to match your own assumptions. 📈

🎮 Have a play! Then either:

  • 🎥 Watch our how-to video (Katie’s a star 🌟)
  • 📖 Or scroll down for the full geeky breakdown of how it all works

⚠️ Important Rebel Note: This is not investment advice. It’s an educational tool to help you understand the true cost of fees. Please read our disclaimer before you go fee-hunting. 🕵️‍♂️

💻 Best viewed on a big screen (like a laptop or desktop). If you’re on mobile, don’t worry — we’ve got tips further down to help you navigate like a pro. 📱

And hey, we’d LOVE to hear what you think! Drop us a comment at the bottom of the page and let us know how much money you’ve saved (or how angry you are at your old fund manager 😤).

With love and low fees,
Katie & Alan 💚

This video is out of date currently and we will be reshooting soon.

💻 The tool 📈

Fund 1

%

Fund 2

%
Fund 1 final value: -
Fund 2 final value: -

🎛️ Tool Time: How to Use the Fee Comparison Wizard 🧙‍♂️💰

Alright, Rebels — here’s where the magic happens. This tool is your financial X-ray machine 🔍 for spotting sneaky fees that are quietly nibbling away at your future wealth like little investment termites. 🐜💸

🟦 Fund 1 (Left Side, Blue):

This is where you plug in your current fund or the one you’re thinking about investing in. Got a flashy advisor with a shiny brochure and a 7% fee? Pop it in here.

🟩 Fund 2 (Right Side, Green):

We’ve pre-loaded this with the Vanguard FTSE Global All Cap Fund — our low-cost, globally diversified, no-nonsense investing hero. 🦸‍♀️🌍

Once you’ve entered your numbers, the tool crunches the data faster than Alan can say “compound interest” and shows you the difference over 30 years. 📊

🧩 What You Can Tweak:

  • Initial investment – Got a lump sum ready to go? Stick it in here. This might be how much you already have or the amount you are going to start investing from now.
  • Monthly investment – How much are you investing each month? If you invest yearly, divide by 12 and pop that in.
  • Annual growth rate (%) – What is the average yearly return you expect? The financial industry often uses 7% as a long‑term estimate for broad-based global index funds. Our own portfolio has averaged over 13% over the years. We set the default at 10% as a realistic middle ground. You can adjust this number to match your own expectations or comfort level.
  • Fund name – Give your fund a name so you know what you’re comparing. If you don’t, it’ll just say “Fund 1” and “Fund 2” like a boring spreadsheet.
  • Initial fee (lump sum) – Some advisors charge a % just to start. We’ve seen this as high as 7% 😱. Enter the % or £ amount and select the right one from the dropdown.
  • Initial fee (monthly) – Same as above, but for your monthly contributions. Vanguard? That’s a big fat 0%.
  • Ongoing Charges Fee (OCF) – This is the annual % fee for running the fund. Vanguard FTSE Global All Cap is 0.23% in the UK.
  • Advisor fee – If your advisor charges you a % or flat fee for their wisdom, enter it here.
  • Annual platform fee – What the platform charges you to hold your investments. Vanguard UK is 0.15% with a cap (most investment advisors don’t cap their fees, why would they? It is not in their best interests! But some of the good guys do so you don’t end up overpaying!).
  • Minimum platform fee? – Some platforms say “you’ll pay at least £X per year.” If so, tick “Yes” and enter the amount. Vanguard has a £4 a month minimum in the UK.
  • Platform fee cap? – Some platforms say “you’ll never pay more than £X.” Tick “Yes” and enter the cap.
  • Exit fee – Planning to leave your fund one day? Some providers charge you to break up with them 💔. Enter the % or £ amount here. One of our least favourite firms in the world SJP are famous for high exit fees which still exist even though the regulator told them off!

🧪 Want to Try a Real-Life Example?

Here’s what Katie’s old fund looked like (aka: the expensive mistake that inspired this whole thing):

  • Fund name: Penny Group
  • Initial & monthly fees: 3% 😬
  • OCF: 1.61%
  • Platform fee: 0.60% (no cap)
  • Exit fee: £0 (finally, something nice)

🕰️ Why 30 Years? Because You’re Not Just Investing Until You Retire… 💀

You might be thinking, “30 years?! I don’t have that long!” But hold up — let’s talk about your real investing timeline.

Most people think their investment horizon ends the day they retire. Nope. Wrong. 🚫 Your investing timeline isn’t until you retire — it’s until you expire. 💀💸

If you’re 60 now, you might live another 30 years (or more!). That means your money needs to keep working long after you’ve stopped. Whether you’re drawing down your pension, living off dividends, or just trying to outlive your cat 🐱 — your investments are still in the game.

And here’s the kicker: fees compound just like your returns do. Over 30 years, even a 1% difference in fees can cost you tens of thousands. That’s the difference between sipping cocktails on a beach 🏖️ or sipping lukewarm tea in a drafty flat. ☕️🧣

So yes, we use 30 years because that’s when the difference becomes crystal clear. It’s not about being young — it’s about being smart. 🧠💪

    🎯 What This Tool Actually Does (and Doesn’t Do) 🧠

    Let’s get one thing straight: this tool has one job — to show you the impact of fees on your investments over time. That’s it. No more, no less. 🧮💥

    It won’t tell you which fund will perform better. It won’t predict the next stock market crash. And it definitely won’t make you a cup of tea. ☕ (Martin is working on that last one.)

    Why? Because we wanted to laser-focus on just one thing: how much fees are quietly robbing you of your future wealth. Once you understand that, you’ll never look at a 1% fee the same way again. 😤

    We’re building other tools to tackle things like fund performance, retirement planning, and tax — but for now, this one’s all about the fee monster. 🐉

    🧮 Assumptions Behind the Scenes

    • 10% Growth Rate 📈
      The tool assumes a nice, steady 10% annual return. Real life? Not so smooth. Markets go up, down, sideways, and occasionally do backflips. But this gives you a solid baseline — and yes, you can change it if you want to get fancy.
    • No Tax 🙈
      We’ve kept it simple and assumed you get to keep all your gains. In reality, tax might nibble away at your returns — unless you’re investing through tax-efficient accounts like a pension, SIPP, or ISA in the UK. (And if you’re not… why not?!)

    💬 Talk to Us! We’re All Ears 👂

    We’d absolutely LOVE to hear what you think of the tool! 💚
    Did it blow your mind? Save you thousands? Make you want to fire your financial advisor into the sun? ☀️🚀

    Drop us a comment at the bottom of the page and let us know:

    • What you discovered 🕵️‍♀️
    • What surprised you 😲
    • What you’d love us to build next 🔧

    Got questions about how to use the tool? Confused by a dropdown? Wondering if your fund is secretly robbing you? Ask us! We’re here to help — no jargon, no judgement, just Rebel-style support. 💪

    👇 Keep scrolling to find out why fees are THE #1 predictor of how well your investments will do (and why we won’t shut up about them). 🎯

    ⚔️ The Difference: Fees vs. Performance — Who Wins the Wealth War? 💸🏁

    Can you really judge a fund by its fees alone? 🤔 Are fees really the biggest factor in how well your investments do?

    Short answer: YES. Long answer: YEEEESSSSSS. 📣

    At Rebel Finance School, we bang on about fees like a broken drum 🥁 — and for good reason. The tool above shows you just how brutal a 1% fee can be over time. It’s not just a rounding error — it’s a retirement-wrecker. 😱

    But let’s break it down. There are two big players in the investment game:

    1. 💰 Fees – This is what you pay to play. Some funds (like American Vanguard ones) charge as little as 0.04%. Others? We’ve seen eye-watering fees of 7% from slick-talking advisors in shiny suits. That’s not investing — that’s daylight robbery.
    2. 📈 Performance – This is how well your fund actually does. Do the stocks go up? Do you get dividends? Does your money grow like a well-fed houseplant? 🌿

    Now here’s the kicker: you can’t control performance. The market does what it wants. But you can control fees — and that’s why they matter so much. Every pound you don’t pay in fees is a pound that stays in your investment, compounding away like a little financial snowball. ❄️➡️⛄

    So yes, fees aren’t the only thing — but they’re the first thing you should look at. Because if you’re paying 2% in fees and getting 1% in returns… well, you’re not investing. You’re donating. 😬

    🧠 The Truth About Fees vs. Performance: The Dream vs. Reality 💸✨

    The tool above focuses purely on fees — but that’s just one part of the investing puzzle. For Katie’s first flashy advisor, not only were the fees sky-high, but the performance was… well, let’s just say underwhelming. 😬

    Here’s the dream they sell you:
    💼 “Sure, our fees are higher — but that’s because we’re better. We’ll outperform the market and make you more money than those boring index funds ever could.”

    Sounds tempting, right? Like paying extra for the Rolls Royce of investing. 🚗💨 But here’s the reality: that dream? It’s upside-down. In fact, the data shows the opposite is true.

    📚 What the Research Says (a.k.a. Alan Gets Geeky)

    After reading Trillions (a brilliant book about the rise of index funds), I dove into the research. One study in particular — “Shopping for Alpha: You Get What You Don’t Pay For” — blew my mind. 🤯

    Vanguard looked at a bunch of factors to see what actually predicts fund performance:

    • Expense Ratio – How much the fund charges you
    • Fund Concentration – How diversified it is (e.g. number of stocks)
    • Turnover – How often the fund buys and sells investments
    • Fund Size – Total assets under management
    • Past Alpha – How much the fund beat the market in the past

    And the winner was… 🥁

    “The expense ratio separated poorly performing funds from better performing funds more successfully than all other metrics we analyzed.”

    Translation? The cheaper the fund, the better it performed — on average.
    And combining other metrics didn’t help. The expense ratio alone was the most powerful predictor of future performance. 🎯

    🤔 “But Don’t You Get What You Pay For?”

    Not in investing. In fact, it’s the opposite.

    “On average, lower-cost funds tend to produce better future results than higher-cost funds.”
    — Wallick, Wimmer, and Martielli (2013); Philips et al. (2014)

    Crazy, right? The less you pay, the more you keep — and the better your returns tend to be. Why? Because low-cost funds are usually passive (like index funds), and high-cost ones are usually active (with managers trying to beat the market). And historically, passive funds have outperformed active ones in most cases. 📉➡️📈

    So if you’re looking for one simple predictor of long-term success?
    👉 It’s fees. The lower, the better.
    High fees don’t just cost you more — they often come with worse performance too. That’s a double whammy. 💥💥

    You may have seen a recent open letter I wrote to Wealthify which was entitled Wealthify or Poorify. Wealthify have high fees and poor performance. They promise the dream of investing with us will create better returns, but they have FAILED to do this over the long term.

    If you want to have a read of the overview from Vanguard, you can see if here and then dig down further if you want to. The impact of investment costs | Vanguard

    🧭 What You Can Control — And Why It Matters 💪

    Let’s be real: there’s a lot in investing you can’t control.
    You can’t stop recessions. You can’t predict pandemics. And unless you’re secretly running a country, you probably can’t prevent geopolitical chaos either. 🌍💥

    But here’s the good news: fees? You can control those.
    And doing so might just be the single most powerful move you make as an investor. 🎯

    If You’re in the UK or US…

    You’ve got it easy. Just invest directly through Vanguard and you’ll be slashing fees like a financial ninja. 🥷💸
    If you’re elsewhere in the world, you can still access Vanguard funds — you might just need to go through a different platform. But the principle is the same: low fees = more money for you.

    You can find our Full Platform Review for the UK here.

    📝 Your Rebel Homework

    Time to take action. For every investment account you have — pensions, ISAs, 401(k)s, SIPPs, Roths, and beyond — find out:

    1. 💼 What are you actually invested in?
    2. 🔍 What are the underlying funds?
    3. 💸 What are the fees? (Platform, OCF, entry/exit, advisor fees — the whole lot!)
    4. 🏢 What kind of pension do you have?
      • Is it defined benefit or defined contribution?
      • Does your employer match contributions?

    The more you know, the more power you have. Knowledge = control. Control = freedom. 🚀

    So go forth, Rebels. Take back control of your money. Slash those fees. And don’t leave your financial future in the hands of people who profit whether you win or lose. 💥

    🙏 Thank You for Reading!

    You’re amazing for making it this far. Want more investing goodness? Head over to our Investing Overview Page for more tools, tips, and Rebel wisdom. 💚

    Sending you huge Peace and Pineapples

    Alan and Katie and the Rebel Ninjas

    PS Martin Rebel Ninja we could not have done this without you. You are amazing.