SMSF questions

Originally posted by ACWMR ↑

You don't need to be in a hurry. Your funds are likely already in a managed fund and most should allow you to keep them in there till you are ready. Unless you need funds to live on, so need to start pension phase quickly, I would suggest you take more time to shop around, including talking to people like Dixon Advisors and a suburban accountant who can offer the lowest overhead of all. I use the latter and the costs are 0.25-.3% of invested funds to do tax and compliance for 2 individuals, a family company and corporate trustee.

Do some reading and "paper-trading", to develop an investing style that suits you and your temperament. How do you cope with uncertainty, risk and being proven wrong even when you are right. The market is quite schizophrenic Join peer support organisations like Australian Investors Association, Association of Independent Retirees, Australian Shareholders Association.

Attend seminars and conferences, some will let you in for free as an investor, walk around shopping centres, surf the web, read a wide variety of newspapers and magazines, not just The Australian and Fin Review, spend time in cafes around the CBD, it is amazing what you will hear, tour parts of your city and state to see what has been going on that you are not aware of, before you start signing cheques and transfer authorisations.

Read biographies of Warren Buffett, the writings of his (and my) guru, Ben Graham, anything by Phil de Muth who is a comic/serious investor/author who has the rare knack of making wealth and risk management entertaining.

Avoid TV presenters like Alan Kohler and his ilk who have 20:20 hindsight and are very good at making themselves sound clever, but actually have no clue what is going to happen tomorrow. (Hint, no-one does)

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Hi Fangk
My interpretation is that the SMSF must be regulated to be complaint.
Here is some stuff from ATO
In order to be registered as an SMSF, you need to formally elect for the fund to be regulated by the ATO
A non-regulated fund cannot be a complying fund unless it is an exempt public sector superannuation schemes which is exempt from regulation.
Mor here https://www.ato.gov.au/Super/Self-m...nd-regulate-SMSFs/How-your-SMSF-is-regulated/

I have been with Esuper 6 years or so and have no complaints, there is a large range of investment options including international shares, property and unlisted funds. The annual compliance is very straightforward. You do need to put some time into selecting your investments but you can be as conservative or aggresive as you like. With plenty of ETFs available you can easily mimic a managed superfund and probably save on costs.
If nothing else like that I can set stop loss so if there is a crash I can protect my investment, I a not young enough to wait for it to come back up!