DFA vs Vanguard

[Docbeans]

Hi all,

I have access to DFA funds in my HSA (Healthequity) and the Utah 529s for my kids. I was hoping to add some mid cap and small cap funds in my portfolio via these. My question is, which fund co. do I go with? ... DFA's expense ratio is much higher than vanguard's for what seems to be very comparable performances over the last 1/3/5 yrs... not that we should be performance chasing

For eg., VEMPX (Vanguard mid-cap blend) has ER 0.06%, whereas DFVEX (DFA midcap value) has ER 0.32%. And, VSMAX (Vanguard small cap blend) has ER 0.09% vs DFA's DFSTX (small blend) is 0.37%.

I am not sure whether the underlying holdings are different enough in the two cos. for me to justify using the DFA funds instead of their Vanguard counterparts.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Docbeans]

Bump. No one?

[The White Coat Investor]

I decided to go with DFA Small Value in the Utah 529 for the kids. Then I discovered that the Utah 529 doesn't allow you to put more than 25% of the account into any single small value fund. So I put 25% into the DFA Small Value fund and 25% into the Vanguard Small Value fund. So far, the Vanguard fund is winning.

[Docbeans]

Thank you- that is real-time evidence-based information!