Probably going to get ridiculed with this one, but here it goes...
My wife and I have had a financial advisor for the past 3 years. She has given us some good advice and been helpful, considering we knew absolutely nothing about investing when we started our account with her. She provided some great options to us for what to do with our money, but the only main thing we currently do is have a brokerage account invested in various ETF's that "her team" has chosen based on our risk assessment. I periodically receive buy & sell orders, which is nice to see that the account *is* in-fact being actively managed to a degree, but the returns over the past 3 years have mimicked that of the S&P 500, so they're really not beating the market.
We pay her 1% of our portfolio on a yearly basis as an "advisors fee" and currently have roughly $450k in the account. When we first started with her we were really clueless to investing as a whole, but over the years I have taken the time to learn enough to get by - CONSIDERABLY more than I knew when we started. I recently (fairly bluntly) asked her what ROI we are receiving for the 1% advisors fee we pay if they're not beating the market. She gave me the generic answer I assumed she would which was "the advisors fee is for financial guidance as it pertains to college funds, retirement goals, tax deference strategies, etc.". Okay, all makes sense and is respected, but the kicker is a few weeks prior I had asked for help setting up my son's 529 and she told me "we don't do that". What she meant was they don't have the ability to actively manage it through Fidelity, and therefore couldn't make their 1% on it. That rubbed me the wrong way because I would have at least expected her to offer assistance in choosing the best 529 plan and portfolio for my son based on things like state tax incentives, fees, etc. But I ended up having to do all the research myself, which I realized wasn't nearly as scary as I thought it would have been. Still though, would have been nice if the $4,500 a year I am paying them would have saved me the time in doing the homework myself...
I'm starting to feel - especially from reading others' sentiments on this subreddit - that an advisor is primarily for someone nearing retirement age who needs to have a really good strategy with their money so they are protected, and/or for someone who is way too emotional to manage their account themselves - i.e. have someone there to talk them off a ledge when the market drops 25% and they would otherwise make a bad move at the wrong time out of fear.
My wife and I are both very young and, barring nothing unexpected, should not need this money for quite a long time. As it currently stands I would love for this to ultimately be our retirement fund and not touch it for another 25+ years. Over that much time, that 1% fee we're paying adds up to a good chunk of money, esp. when factoring in compounding interest. I'm not trying to be stingy and just pocket as much money as possible, esp. if there is good reason to be paying it. But it's certainly not nothing, and I wouldn't mind it if I felt like we were actually *getting* something for paying it.
Is this a situation where it would make way more sense to stick that 1% back into our pocket and just do something like VT & chill? Or do I just stay the course, let her and her team continue "managing" everything, and when if/when we need the help I have someone readily available to me?