All young financial planners need to go to the Financial Planning Association (FPA) NexGen Gathering. That’s just my opinion. But, bear in mind, I’ve been to a handful of conferences: Bogleheads® Conference Ritholtz’s Evidence-Based Investing (EBI) West FinCon FPA Minnesota Symposium JunXure’s conference many Dimensional Fund Advisors (DFA) events a handful of Fidelity events the […]
Practice Management
Onboarding New Clients from an Exit Plan
If buying a book of business from retiring advisor interests you, know that there are many stages in the Exit planning process: Prospecting for your target acquisition (i.e. go find an advisor looking to retire!) Agreeing to the terms of the sale structure Executing the terms of the deal (i.e. bringing the new clients into […]
Advice for New Financial Planners
I could never do as good a job as Michael Kitces, so I’ll just link his article on this very same subject here. I won’t bother to repeat the points he already made. I’ll just share something I wish someone had told me when I got into the field of financial planning. The Job Description […]
Annuity Rule of Thumb
As a fee-only financial adviser and fiduciary, much of what I do at Define Financial involves unwinding new clients from the garbage they were previously sold by commissioned salespeople. (Naturally, I have a strong opinion about this!) Sometimes, this means trying to figure out how to get a client out of a non-traded REIT. Other […]
Setting Fees for Financial Planning
Two recent episodes in setting financial planning fees merit sharing, and both have the same ultimate take-away: don’t think you’re not worth it – because the right clients think you are.
Consumers are Getting Smarter
Prospective clients are now making amazing comments that I’ve never heard from them before: Are you a fiduciary?