In my opinion, there are two reasons to hire someone to do something: 1) I don't want to do it and/or 2) the person I hire can do a better job than I can (and that includes jobs that I am incapable of). Why did we hire a financial advisor? It was some of both. My husband and I have always handled our own investments and at one time investing was a favorite reading/research topic for us. Then kids and life got in the way (and took away much of the free cash we used to invest). We were somewhat aware that the funds we bought way back when were not the ones recommended today, but inertia had struck and while we talked about making a change, we never did. Then my dad passed away and I realized I would soon have a large chunk of money to invest. I also realized that we weren't up-to-date on the best places to invest, nor were we sure what asset allocation was best for us. While we have always lived beneath our means and saved money yearly, we really didn't know if we were on target to meet our retirement goals. We have between ten and fifteen years left in the workforce and our house is paid for; now is the season for the race to retirement and we wanted to make sure we were on the right track and running fast enough. We want someone to keep an eye on the funds and to get us out of those that aren't doing what they were purchased to do. We wanted a plan and we were willing to pay for it.
Did you hire a percent of allocation fee person, a load person, or a flat fee person. I have such a difficult time trying to figure out who to hire. So far my success rate has been 1 out of 4. My first advisor was the best. We were very sad when she retired, but she had established us on a good road.
ReplyDeleteHe gets a percent of assets under managment. I don't know how much he pays the brokerage people who pick the mutual funds. He interfaces with us, and, I had hoped would advise us about whether we were saving enough, how to structure things to take care of Jay etc. Right now we are very much on the fence about keeping him.
DeleteHe gets a percent of assets under managment. I don't know how much he pays the brokerage people who pick the mutual funds. He interfaces with us, and, I had hoped would advise us about whether we were saving enough, how to structure things to take care of Jay etc. Right now we are very much on the fence about keeping him.
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