Guides › Switching Financial Advisors
Updated September 3, 2026. Quick answer: you open the account at the receiving firm and sign the transfer form there; the new firm pulls the account through ACATS. Merrill Edge Self-Directed prices a full account transfer at $49.95, and the schedule prints “(Not charged in addition to closeout fees)” on that same row, so the $49.95 closeout line is the same charge and not a second one. There is no advisory agreement to end, because the account is disclosed as pure brokerage. If you work with a Merrill financial advisor rather than self-directing, your numbers are different and the Merrill Lynch page is the one you want. This page states only what Merrill itself publishes.
The published numbers
Every figure below was read out of the Merrill Edge Self-Directed Schedule of miscellaneous account and service fees, footer code MAP8318446 | SHEET-11-25-0005 | 00-66-0867NSB | 11/2025, retrieved from mlaem.fs.ml.com on September 3, 2026. The schedule says of itself: “Some of these fees may be waived under certain conditions. Fees are subject to change.”
| What you are doing | What the schedule charges | Frequency |
|---|---|---|
| Full account transfer out, various account types | $49.95 | Transactional |
| Closeout on BASIC, IRA, IRRA, ROTH, SEP or SIMPLE | $49.95 | Transactional |
| Delivery of a non-government security, DRS eligible | $25 | Transactional |
| Delivery of a non-government security, DRS non-eligible or non-participating | $500 | Transactional |
| Legal transfer through the Depository Trust Company | $75 | Transactional |
| Government security transfer | $125 | Transactional |
| Security reorganization, voluntary exchange | $30 | Transactional |
| Past due exchanges for physical securities | $50 | Transactional |
The two $49.95 rows are one charge, not two. The schedule lists a “Full Account Transfer Fee” and, separately, a “Closeout Fee” for “BASIC, IRA, IRRA, ROTH, SEP, SIMPLE $49.95 Transactional”. Both are $49.95, which is exactly the arithmetic a reader is likely to double. The transfer row carries its own parenthetical, “(Not charged in addition to closeout fees)”, so a full ACATS transfer that also closes the account is one $49.95 charge. Budget it once.
The number that can actually hurt is the delivery fee, and it is $500. If the receiving firm will not hold something you own and you choose to deliver the position out rather than sell it, whether that security participates in the Direct Registration System is the difference between $25 and $500 per transaction on the same schedule. A physical certificate can also draw the $75 legal transfer row or the $50 past due physical exchange row. Ask before you instruct a delivery, because the exit fee is not the expensive line here.
There is no advisory contract to terminate, and that is the point of this account. The client relationship agreement states that Merrill Edge Self-Directed Investing “is the marketing name for certain brokerage services offered to clients on a self-directed basis through Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Incorporated”. It then says plainly: “Neither Merrill, nor MESD, nor any Merrill or MESD representative, will provide you with investment advice, including any recommendations, or offer any opinion regarding the suitability of any security, order, transaction, or strategy in a Merrill Edge Self-Directed Investing Account, or monitor your investment or the appropriateness of your account or service level, or alert you to any recommended change to your investments, investment accounts, or services.” So there is no notice period to serve, no advisory fee to have refunded, and no adviser whose agreement has to be unwound. A separate advisory relationship at Merrill, if you hold one, runs on its own agreement with its own terms, and this schedule does not govern it.
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Source: WiserAdvisor’s service descriptionWhat may not move as it is
ACATS moves what the receiving firm is willing and able to hold. Everything else has to be sold or delivered out separately, and in a taxable account a forced sale is a realised gain in the year you switch. The question to ask the receiving firm is literal: “Can you hold every position on this statement?” Ask about proprietary funds, thinly traded issues and anything you hold in certificate form by name, because those are the positions where the $500 delivery row and the $30 voluntary reorganization row come into play. The categories that commonly do not transfer.
Closing the account vs transferring it: the $49.95 transfer-out fee
Closing an account and transferring it are different events. A transfer in kind moves your holdings to the new firm as they are. Closing by selling everything and withdrawing the cash is a liquidation. A liquidation is a taxable event; a transfer in kind is not, see IRS Publication 550 and Publication 590-B.
How do I close a Merrill Edge account?
To leave without selling, open the account at the receiving firm and start the transfer there. To close by liquidating, sell the holdings and withdraw the cash. The charge for moving the account is covered in the next answer. The same schedule lists “Closeout on BASIC, IRA, IRRA, ROTH, SEP or SIMPLE” at $49.95.
What is the Merrill Edge transfer out fee?
The Merrill Edge Self-Directed Schedule of miscellaneous account and service fees lists “Full account transfer out, various account types” at $49.95.
What is the Merrill Edge ACAT fee?
ACATS is the system the receiving firm uses to pull an account. The amount published for sending an account out is $49.95, from the Merrill Edge Self-Directed Schedule of miscellaneous account and service fees.
The sequence
1. Pull a current statement for every account, showing the exact registration, the account numbers and the complete holdings list. The receiving firm works from that, not from memory. 2. Ask the receiving firm what it cannot hold. The question is literally “Can you hold every position on this statement?”, and anything they cannot hold has to be sold or delivered out, which in a taxable account 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 the instruction or take exception to it, and three business days after validation to complete the transfer. 4. Send a dated termination letter for the record, and the generator writes it, then 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 Merrill 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. Budget the $49.95 once rather than twice, and price any delivery out separately before you instruct it. Whether the exit charge is worth paying at all 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, and what switching costs across firms. To put the exit charge next to the fee you would stop paying, the switching advisors cost calculator returns the break-even in months.
Comparing exit steps at more than one firm? How to leave Baird, Betterment, Citi, Commonwealth Financial Network, Equitable Advisors, Janney Montgomery Scott and Oppenheimer, fee by fee and form by form.
Merrill Edge is Bank of America’s self-directed brokerage arm, alongside two other major discount brokerages’ own outgoing-transfer fees: Charles Schwab ($50 full transfer) and Fidelity ($0).
For your own numbers, run the AUM Fee Calculator 2026: 1% Advisor Fee in Dollars.
See Read the adviser-hiring guide for more on this.
Weighing whether to move ahead? Read the full Merrill Lynch 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.
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