Bob, I feel your pain :-) I really do. Have you ever dealt with TRS? I spent something like 6 months to a year, including meeting in person at least a monthly basis, to get my parents' retirement accounts straightened out with them. Dealing with TRS and TIAA is like night and, well, twilight.
You find yourself in the position of having clients dump all their TIAA issues in your lap, and being largely unable to help because of the lock up. Here though, I'm somewhat unsympathetic to the "victims". Don't invest in what you don't understand.
At retirement, TIAA usually does not require participants to annuitize (the 10-year certain TPA or a lifetime annuity). Most contracts allow retireees to keep money in TIAA Traditional, subject only to RMD requirements. On the other hand, if you want your money immediately at retirement, some contracts (e.g. SRA, GSRA) allow that. The tradeoff is that participants get a lower rate of return. Flexibility isn't free, at TIAA or elsewhere.
See FAQ #27: https://www.tiaa.org/public/pdf/TT_FAQ.pdf
TIAA Guide to Your Payment Options: https://www.tiaa.org/public/pdf/TT_FAQ.pdf
As a DIY retail investor, I personally focus more on the investment products available and their costs than the service offered. So I'll invest with Vanguard, even though the service I receive isn't as great as it is at Schwab or Fidelity. Likewise, if TIAA has something different to offer me, I'll consider them as well. So long as they can get their 1099s straight (something that Scottrade botched badly when I tried them out years ago), I can live with most other foibles. But each person has his own priorities.

I hesitate to wade back into a discussion on TIAA, since some folks obviously have had good experiences with them. The reason for my earlier comments are simply that, based on our experiences over the last 30 years, working with clients who have accounts at TIAA has not been positive. Acknowledging that all these accounts were 403b, mostly in the traditional fixed-annuity bucket (which is a decent product), our experience was and is that working with TIAA customer service people has been worse than having teeth pulled. And then you have the salespeople who fail to disclose the roadblocks of moving dollars from the traditional bucket to the CREF bucket, or the 10-year withdrawal requirement at retirement. Perhaps they have a different service culture on the retail brokerage side of their business. I shut up now.

@ Crash: I was a bit surprised to learn the other day that an investment in the French market (le CAC 40) in 2007 would have earned just about zilch in the last 10 years. Not surprising a European fund would have done poorly.

Thanks @Ted...perfect article for my friend's 30 year old. I might even learn something.
Hope the next 46 years are as generous. What am I saying, I won't be around for it to matter.

Macron won, 2-1. Holy landslides, Batman. When I started investing, (2002) I stayed away from Europe. Old money. Dead money. Asia was charging ahead. I owned Matthews, back then. The Financial Crash caused by the criminal banksters struck the periphery hard: Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Greece. Italy, too. And there are still systemic issues to be dealt with ... Was Ireland able to climb out of crisis sooner than the others--- via a new Austerity--- because it is smaller and more homogeneous? I just don't know. Lots of ANGRY people, when suddenly, WATER became a metered commodity. I lived in a town here in the States years ago, at the bottom of the Northern Panhandle of West Virginia below Wheeling, where even in 1992, water was not metered.
My holding in PRESX about 18 months or 2 years ago (TRP Europe) went nowhere, at break-neck speed. I guess I missed the sudden upsurge on the heels of easing by the ECB. (Draghi.) I dumped it. Currently, my PRIDX is doing much better. Its portfolio is pretty evenly split between Europe and Asia. A smattering in Latin America (4%.) Is the PRIDX fund Manager just better at stock selection than the PRESX guy, with regard to the EU portion of holdings? Of course it may be that Asian holdings doing so well today may serve to cancel-out any EU under-performance within the fund. Within the overall portfolio, PRIDX holds 15% in GB, and 28% in DEVELOPED Europe. I'm just thinking out loud--- so to speak.
What I'm wondering is: just how un-dead has the EU become? Investing strictly in Europe got me nowhere, 2 years ago..... I don't think I'd own a dedicated-Europe fund again, anyhow, but since I own PRIDX now, I'm simply wondering...

FYI: For years, U.S. stocks have been a primary driver of global equity market gains, posting far stronger results than the rest of the world. That may be about to change.
Regards,
Ted
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/miss-the-bull-market-investors-say-the-next-one-will-be-overseas-2017-05-09/print

@BobC Yes, lots of talk, but mediocre performance (with the exception of DSENX). Sort of reminds me of Bill Gross during his last few years at PIMCO.

Have been with Schwab for a long time now, almost ten years! Before that I have used Scottrade, TD, WellsTrade and also have an IRA at Fidelity. I echo observations by others, being very satisfied after consolidating essentially all our assets at Schwab. Great personal support! Helped my daughter open an account and explained in great detail all options, walked her through all paperwork in person. Nice website, good access to research, broad fund availability! As msf and others have mentioned, their ATM/debit card is great for international travel. Really no negatives so far (touch wood)!

@Ben - My 2 cents. IT is the timing of the fund opening. International / Emerging are likely to do better than US in the next few years - seems to be the general consensus.
Grandeur timed their launches well. Rondure probably has too. I'm okay buying with a tight stop as long as they are NTF. One does not have to suffer extended downturns, and frankly I abhor anyone calling one who sells a "trader".
The only funds I buy and hold are the "eponymous" go anywhere variety, and even those I will time my entries. Just my 2 cents.

@bee, I agree with your assessment of @Ted 's comment, keep it simple. I wish I would have done that many years ago and kept the faith. Sometimes here at MFO I think we, and I'll include myself, want to build a fantasy football team (or fantasy-fund manager team might be a better analogy) collecting all the best funds we can muster when a few simple index funds, especially at 30, would beat any fantasy team over the long haul.
Congrats to you bee for helping a friend and also to your friend for looking for advice.

To be honest with you I don't know how I would do a MF portfolio these days as the 5 I hold add up to less than 6% of my total portfolio. That's kinda why I asked those that do. And up until a few years ago I also held no bond or bond type funds but I am currently ridiculously long in two bond CEF's, PDI & PCI. What Ivascyn has done and is doing is hard to ignore. Thank you for some clarity.

I agree that there are probably too many funds.If index funds are available with reasonable expense ratios I would compare the performance of the total stock market fund to the suggested portfolio reflecting the weightings. I suspect that he total market fund will outperform . I think a reasonable portfolio fora 30 year old would be 75% us stocks 5% emerging market, 10% developed market and 10% bonds. After a market rise for 8 years it seems piggish to not have a source of funds like a bond fund to rebalance after a significant decline

Got a note today from a friend who's son is recently changed jobs after 8+ years and is looking at rolling over his 401k to a new employer's 401k plan. He's been given the following recommendation of funds and percentage allocations. I told him that it might be worth sending it through the "MFO carwash".
Any thoughts would be much appreciated from the point of view of fund choices (individually) and from the perspective of overall portfolio construction. Here's the suggestions he received:
JVASX - 21%
MFEIX - 21%
GOGIX - 16%
HFMIX - 8%
JVMIX - 8%
PONPX - 8%
PVSYX - 8%
MLPOX - 5%
HIEMX - 5%
Thanks in advance.

Gosh BobC, am I sensing a little hostility here? You used to say (correctly) that TIAA Traditional (what you called the "traditional bucket") provided "limited options to make changes". But now here you are saying that they always "treat client dollars as TIAA-CREF dollars and put up all kinds of roadblocks to retain them."
That's a rather curious observation in a thread ostensibly addressing retail customers, and discussing nonTIAA funds that one might invest in through them. If I invested in, say, TWEIX through a TIAA DIY brokerage account, how would they treat my client dollars as their own?
When I look at their retail after tax VA (Intelligent Life), I see a product that Kitces praised as being clear and flexible when it came out a decade ago. As far as putting up roadblocks to getting dollars out is concerned, I see TIAA doing just the opposite. With most annuities, at death (if not annuitized), it's possible to keep the money there for years. With this annuity, if it doesn't go to the spouse, the entire annuity must be cashed out immediately.
It is true that the annuity discourages people from leaving (while alive) by dropping the annuity fees to a mere 10 basis points after a decade. If that's the kind of roadblock you were talking about, give me more roadblocks :-)

I'm looking specifically for growth because I believe this bull market has years left to run - perhaps to 2030. After nearly a decade, we're finally transitioning from an interest rate driven market to an earnings driven market, and growth stocks are likely to benefit the most. Earnings will come from the application of new technologies.

Okay. Ask yourself this question. What are the changes of an actively managed mid cap growth fund outperforming VIMSX over the next 13 years?
I don't mean to preach. When I buy an actively managed fund, I'm not trying to mimic/outperform the market. I want to buy it because I want to assume MANAGER RISK. In my retirement accounts, I buy index funds because I am assuming MARKET RISK.
The worst outcome is when you get both MANAGER RISK and MARKET RISK. So if you want to buy an actively managed mid growth fund, maybe you can consider something like VMRGX. Take any of the above suggestions that are "mid growth" and compare against VMRGX. Hopefully that is instructive.

VIEIX, VIMSX would be my recommendations, frankly. Not sure why you want "growth". FMIMX is another option.

I'm looking specifically for growth because I believe this bull market has years left to run - perhaps to 2030. After nearly a decade, we're finally transitioning from an interest rate driven market to an earnings driven market, and growth stocks are likely to benefit the most. Earnings will come from the application of new technologies.

We have used Schwab (almost) exclusively for our client accounts for 20+ years. No company is perfect, but the combination of technology, pricing, and service has been darned good over the years. My view is that Vanguard and Fidelity (to some extent) have been late to the party in terms of services they offer. Vanguard has a brokerage account capability, but it is light years behind TD, Schwab and a handful of others from a technology standpoint.

I would like to d/l price info (price, date/time, etc) for a group of about 10 specific stocks and mutual funds. I've used yahoo.com for several years, but they've changed formats several times w/o warning, forcing me to revise my processing. It's frustrating. I would like to find a good, solid, established, easy-to-use source.
Suggestions?

Thanks for the praise, though rather overstated. Thanks also for the reminder that the biggest problem (at least for me) with the BofA cards has been their simultaneous paranoia on card use (e.g. refusing a $500 car repair charge 15 miles from home) and frequent issuing of new numbers (due to security breaches on their end).
To protect against problems abroad, I try to always carry cards from two different issuers. Capital One is an excellent card for that, with 1.5% and no foreign transaction fee.
Rather surprisingly, Discover Card is also becoming a reasonable alternative (1% and no foreign transaction fee), since it's been working hard at expanding its overseas presence in the last couple of years.. The current Fidelity VISA card's also reasonable (2% rewards reduced by a 1% foreign transaction fee).

As it turns out, what I keep with Merrill Edge is a fund that they won't sell me (they'll only hold it). A good place to drop a fund that I'm just going to let sit for years. Also, while brokerages make money lending securities that can be sold short, generally mutual funds cannot be shorted.
So Merrill, and its parent BofA are stuck servicing an account that they can't make a dime from, that costs them money to maintain, where I won't be trading (so they'll have to send me periodic inactivity notices costing them more money), and servicing a credit card where they're paying me over 2% on everything I charge on their cards (including Costco).
The only way I can see that I'm helping BofA is that they're able to count me as an account holder when they present to shareholders the number of accounts that are held with them. I think I can live with that.
I wouldn't dream of actually banking with them.