Mutual Fund investment is often seen as a culmination of deliberations about what is good for your money and where it should be invested, for how long, with what expectations, etc. It is often seen as a fulfilment of requirement, like an end point.

However, the real journey of your money and wealth creation actually just begins with you making an investment decision. This journey will bring with it times of great returns, time of despair and uncertainty, extreme rewards, terrifying risks, a lull period, and a whole lot of things that can’t always be anticipated in advance.

A good Certified Financial Planner will be with you through all these stages. Your investment is like a vehicle that embarks on a journey towards your financial goals, sometimes very specific, like your child’s education, a vacation, an indulgence in luxury purchases, purchasing a new property, etc and sometimes just a no-frills-attached objective of growing your wealth.

Each one’s journey down this road is unique but there are some measures that we suggest that help keep this journey as comfortable as possible and ensure that the control of this journey always rests in you.

One major such measure is a regular review of your investment (mutual funds or otherwise) portfolio. Here are some points to keep in mind about such reviews and what makes these reviews so important:

• Frequency: A review of your funds once a year is highly recommended. This frequency is not so high as to obstruct the regular performance of your portfolio or your daily routine but not as low as to miss out important signs. Consider sitting down with your financial planner once a year, even if for 15mins, to just review your portfolio.
• Performance: While no fund is expected to perform at top speed on every given year of the day, and while we assume a good performance spread out over a period of time, it is good to observe if the performance of the fund has consistently been down and introspect into the reason for this. No action should be taken just on the basis of investment returns, but a consistent downward trend should at least keep you cautious and alert. Ask your financial planner about the reasons, if any for such performance.
• Risk: Sometimes, funds are selected and suggested keeping in mind a certain level of risk that they may carry. This riskiness of a fund may change over a period of time and may suddenly not suit your investment needs anymore. A periodic review also helps keep a watch over this. Make sure you discuss with your financial planner the various things that may affect your ability to take this risk
• Goals: The objective with which investments in a fund were made may change. A long-term goal may be replaced with a short-term goal, a low-risk requirement may now be a one that can afford higher risk. Reviews help to realign the portfolios to changing requirements.
• Fund structure: Sometimes, the structure, portfolio, profile and nature of a fund may undergo changes due to management decisions of the fund house. While a fund may still be attractive post this, care needs to be taken to ascertain whether this fund still works for your requirements. Ask questions to your financial planner about what products are a part of your portfolio and why.
• Transactions: Periodic reviews help to plan and time further investments, withdrawals, payment set-up, taxation(a carefully planned withdrawal can help to greatly reduce tax liability and other charges like exit load). You know what you have in mind and reviews help you to plan the execution of the same.

These are just a few points that can be kept in mind while deciding when to have your portfolio reviewed.