A Simple Asset Allocation Spreadsheet

At the bottom of this investment article from Rutgers University, directed to farmers, is a simple Excel spreadsheet one of my clients found for tracking asset allocation.  The spreadsheet is useful for bringing accounts together and determining when re-balancing needs to take place.  As has been discussed here frequently, asset allocation is the most important determinant of overall investment return.

The approach I, and many others, recommend is to identify an appropriate asset allocation and stick to it through market ups and downs.  In this way, the key emotional factors that investors struggle with are defeated.

Cash investments include money market accounts, certificates of deposit, savings accounts, etc.  Fixed income investments include bonds, bond mutual funds, and bond ETFs, etc.

Once you get the hang of it, you should break out equities into domestic and foreign.  Somewhere down the line, you may want to also break out large cap and small cap stocks.