Before you even start to look at investment management fees (MERS), you must first consider how the investment matches with your investment goals, level of risk that you are comfortable with and the length of time before you will need to draw from the investment. Once you have identified several investment strategies that meet your investment goals, take a look at the long term performance of the fund as well as how it has performed on a year to year basis.

Two strategies could have the same long term average return but the one with the lower fee could have fluctuated greatly on a single year by year basis. If you picked this strategy on the merits of having the lowest fee, you have actually increased your portfolio risk by having chosen a more volatile investment.