Guides › Switching Financial Advisors
Updated September 15, 2026. Quick answer: you open an account at the receiving firm and sign the transfer form there; the new firm pulls the accounts through ACATS and you never have to call Fidelity. Budget $0.00 for the transfer itself; Fidelity’s own pricing page lists “Account transfer out” at $0, and a separate customer-service page confirms Fidelity does not charge to move assets away. The firm you’re moving to may still bill you, or Fidelity may reimburse that, depending on where you land.
Leaving other advisory firms: How to Leave Beese Fulmer, How to Leave Betterment and How to Leave BMO Private Wealth.
The published numbers
From fidelity.com/why-fidelity/pricing-fees (“Straightforward and Transparent Pricing”), the published table row: “Account transfer out: $0.” From fidelity.com/customer-service/transfer-assets, verbatim: “We don’t charge a fee to move assets from another institution; however, your current firm may charge to transfer your assets to us.” That sentence is written from Fidelity’s side of an incoming transfer, but it confirms the same policy applies both directions: Fidelity itself does not bill either leg. We could not confirm, on a Fidelity-owned page readable this session, whether a separate IRA-specific close-out fee exists or what Fidelity’s incoming-transfer-fee reimbursement terms are: both are left here as honest gaps rather than filled from a secondary source.
Compare your next step
Just comparing fees? Keep reading the fee guide.Optional next step
Explore an adviser match
Compare the services and the full fee before deciding whether to hire anyone.
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Expect questions about your situation, your name, email and phone, and phone verification by text. A match is not guaranteed.
The form is run by Kapitalwise, our advisor-matching partner. Kapitalwise sends your details to advisers who pay for the introduction, so expect calls and texts. Clear Money Guide is paid when you submit the form, whether or not you ever hire anyone. This is free to you and there is no obligation to hire anyone.
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How our partner relationships workCompare an adviser match before you decide
Ask about the full fee, what it covers and how the adviser is paid. A match is an introduction, not a recommendation from Clear Money Guide.
- Free matching service
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The matching service is run by WiserAdvisor, an independent advisor-matching company. It opens on their site, asks for your ZIP code and a few questions, and matches you with 2 to 3 vetted advisors. It is free to you. WiserAdvisor states the service is built for portfolios of $250,000 and above. By submitting, you consent to emails, phone calls and text messages from WiserAdvisor and up to three advisors, so expect to be contacted. Advisers pay for the introduction. Clear Money Guide is paid when you complete the form, whether or not you ever hire anyone. There is no obligation to hire anyone.
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Source: WiserAdvisor’s service descriptionThe sequence
1. Pull a current statement for every account, showing the exact registration, account numbers and complete holdings list. 2. Check the holdings for anything that will not move. Ask the receiving firm directly: “Can you hold every position on this statement?” Anything they cannot hold has to be sold, and in a taxable account that is a realised gain in the year you switch: the categories that commonly do not transfer. 3. Open the receiving account and sign the transfer form there. Under FINRA Rule 11870 the delivering firm then has one business day to validate and three business days after validation to complete. 4. Send a dated termination letter for the record (the generator writes it) and confirm in writing that billing has stopped.
Two things to get right
Cost basis. Under IRC §6045A the delivering broker must furnish a transfer statement carrying basis for covered securities within 15 days of the transfer. Keep your final statements anyway, and check the first statement at the new firm for positions showing a missing or zero basis. Retirement accounts move as a direct transfer, trustee to trustee, not as a distribution to you. Why that distinction matters. Whether a transfer fee is worth paying at all (or worth nothing, on the pages above) is a question of what you are moving to: our benchmark of published adviser fee schedules puts the weighted median annual cost near $2,000 to $2,500 on $250,000: the benchmark. The general mechanics: switching financial advisors.
Sources
- Fidelity, “Straightforward and Transparent Pricing”: https://www.fidelity.com/why-fidelity/pricing-fees
- Fidelity, “Transfer Assets to Fidelity”: https://www.fidelity.com/customer-service/transfer-assets
Methodology. This page was built September 15, 2026, drawing on Fidelity’s own published pricing pages/PDFs, with sources linked inline; any figure we could not independently confirm this session on a Fidelity-owned page is named as an honest gap above rather than presented as verified. Nothing here is personalized financial, tax, legal, or investment advice. See our Editorial Policy, Corrections, Affiliate Disclosure, and Disclaimer.
Want to know what Fidelity Wealth Management charges before you decide whether to leave? See the dollar breakdown from Fidelity Wealth Management’s own fee disclosure.
Before you decide to leave Fidelity Wealth Management, check whether it owes you a fiduciary duty in the first place.
Weighing whether to move ahead? Read the full Fidelity Wealth Management review, including its fiduciary status and what it costs to leave.
What does leaving cost elsewhere? Compare the published exit fee at 115 advisory firms and brokerages, each taken from that firm’s own schedule or its custodian’s.
Leaving a different firm? See the exit guides for all 189 firms, with the four steps every exit shares.