s/o Hiring a Financial Planner

[Cheerio]

How much money would someone need to have in order to hire a financial planner?

How do I know if there is a minimum that a financial planner will work with?

I'd like to find a financial planner to work with, but I have no idea what to look for. Someone mentioned understanding how fees were charged, but I have no idea about this. Is there a book I could read or websites to look at for this information?

[SJ]

There are financial planners who will work with all levels.

Our minimum is generally $1 million of investable assets. I would say our strategies really don't add much value on accounts with less than $250K. This is a full service form- handling all aspects of trading and management and planning. Very different from a firm that will just check in with you and give you a plan.

If you are looking for an investment manager you can make sure they are registered with the SEC and look up their ADV filings (which will detail strategies, fees, etc.) on this site
www.adviserinfo.sec.gov/IAPD/Content/Search/iapd_Search.aspx

[isabel]

Um, I have a financial planner and my DH and I make less than six figures combined.

He isn't there to help us with investment strategy. He helps us with our 401K investments and advises us on how to trim costs here and there, what financial steps to take next, etc. We paid off over $10K in credit card debt in about 10 months because of his advice. It sounds silly to pay someone to help you budget, but we've learned a lot from him, and, being young, it's really nice to have someone who answers your questions honestly.

He charged us $800 total for building a plan and we will continue to pay him a basic hourly rate when we need to meet with him about anything specific.

I think DH found him on napfa.org.

[SJ]

Yes www.napfa.org is a good place to start if you are just looking for overall strategy and check-ins and not a full-service shop to make all buy/sell decisions and trades for you.

Asking family/friends for recommendations is a good idea as well. A lot of it boils down to chemistry and trust.

[SJ]

Nov 14, 2012 13:06:25 GMT -5 funnybunny said:

sarajoy12345 - what are the typical fees for the full service you mention? Is there usually a guarantee on the return? Do clients who have the full service ever lose money due to fees being > return?

Our fees work out to around 1% of assets under management per year (it is actually a sliding scale downward, but no one pays more than 1.2%) We do not get any other commissions or incentives for putting clients in certain products or using certain strategies. We do not sell insurance or anything else.

We do not guarantee return as there is inherent risk involved in the market.

I'm not sure how to answer your last question. There are years when clients may lose money but it is because of market conditions, not because of our 1% fee. We only calculate performance net of fees so any return numbers are after fees paid. Over the long-term our client accounts vastly outperform the indices because we are active but also conservative on the type of investments we make. We always keep cash and therefore tend to slightly underperform in bull markets but will greatly outperform in awful bear markets. Every single one of our accounts is individually customized and managed so I can't give aggregated returns (and wouldn't do so on MM even if I could)

[noodleoo]

Nov 14, 2012 12:52:20 GMT -5 isabel said:

Um, I have a financial planner and my DH and I make less than six figures combined.

He isn't there to help us with investment strategy. He helps us with our 401K investments and advises us on how to trim costs here and there, what financial steps to take next, etc. We paid off over $10K in credit card debt in about 10 months because of his advice. It sounds silly to pay someone to help you budget, but we've learned a lot from him, and, being young, it's really nice to have someone who answers your questions honestly.

He charged us $800 total for building a plan and we will continue to pay him a basic hourly rate when we need to meet with him about anything specific.

I think DH found him on napfa.org.

Man, i wish we could find this! We contacted a bunch through napfa.org and they all had $250K minimum for assets and the cost just for the plan was $4500. It was insane, so we gave up again.

[SJ]

Yes there are HUGE differences firm to firm. Meet with a few firms to "interview" them. Find out what they invest in and why. Who makes the research decisions and how? How do they get paid? How have they performed over time? Look at their best year and their worst year. Ask for client references and call them. How do they communicate with their clients? Do they help with overall picture (tax strategy, estate planning, etc)? Look up their credentials and SEC filings. Have they ever been disciplined? Simply put, do you like them? Do you trust them?