My Google 401k was with Vanguard, and I just got a package for rolling it over. Most of our investments are with Etrade. Since I just was using Vanguard b/c that's what Google used, I had assumed that I would roll the 401k over into an IRA on Etrade. But now that I stop and think about it, maybe I should be transferring the ETrade assets to Vanguard rather than vice versa. After all, ETrade is a sort of a ghetto institution as retail brokers go, whereas Vanguard is a company I respect enormously as the greatest power fighting for low cost index funds and against the mutual fund scam industry which skims high fees off investments while rarely beating the market enough to justify them.

For example, while I expect Etrade probably has their clients' securities and their mortgage-based assets segregated such that losses in the latter will not affect the former, there was some discussion on the Google financial planning list about whether people w/ assets greater than the SIPC limit ($500K) on ETrade should be pulling out their money. (For those who don't know, ETrade made a bad foray into the mortgage origination business, and for a little while it looked like they might go bankrupt). I don't think there was actually a risk to client assets, but I would have much higher confidence in that at Vanguard.

Anyway, I'm used to ETrade and it feels like more work to move the larger account, but I don't think the former is a good reason or the latter is actually true.

Also, I assume I should roll over my 401k into an IRA, yes? I don't seem to qualify for a Roth rollover as my modified AGI is > $100K, and there don't seem to be any better options.
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