Last week I discussed the risk of having a long-term financial plan dismantled late in life by adult children, usually with good intentions. What can you do to guard your financial plan against this possibility? Here are several suggestions to consider. Clarify for...
When someone engages an “advice-only” financial planner, the relationship often lasts for the client’s life. I have experienced this with numbers of clients over my 40-year career. One of the main concerns many of my elderly clients express to me is a need to be sure...
Is investing in the stock market akin to gambling? It certainly carries a reasonable amount of risk. Yet, done correctly, investing in the market is not remotely gambling. For comparison, consider games of chance. The best one to play is Blackjack. If you play every...
Transparency is a highly valued attribute that is routinely promised—and frequently undelivered. In fact, it often seems that the more loudly transparency is touted, the more opaqueness is practiced. Perhaps Shakespeare’s famous line from Hamlet, “The lady doth...
Encouraging a 20-something friend at my gym to attend a workshop I was giving on investing and financial planning, I quipped, “I’ll teach you how to be a millionaire.” “Really?” she responded. I quickly explained that, if someone her age invested $6,000 a year in...
If you lose your job, what emotional and professional support should you expect from your financial planner? Ideally, the planner’s first response would be, “Tell me more about what you’re experiencing. How can I best support you in this moment?” Since every client’s...
