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It’s not every day that someone wakes up in the morning and decides to get in touch with a financial planner. Instead, it’s often a pivotal moment, an event, or a concern of some sort, that first triggers the search for advice.
Here are some of the financial concerns clients have when they first seek advice, and how financial advice can help to address these.
“I’m making good money but I’m not where I thought I’d be”
This is a really common concern for new clients. After years of building on their career, they are now making good money, but in terms of their actual wealth position, it just isn’t where they had expected to be at this point of life. For these people, there is often a nagging sense that they could be in a lot better of a financial position.
Regardless of your position or needs, financial advice should always start at the same place – understanding your goals. Great financial advice is designed to help you achieve the meaningful goals that matter most to you, as quickly and as safely as possible.
For clients with this concern of falling behind, the priority is not just about understanding where they thought they’d be, but what matters to them moving forward. What are they working towards, what goals matter most – is it supporting the kids to buy their first home, travelling, retiring at a certain age? Once this is understood, financial advice can then help to optimise progress. How can your rate of progression be accelerated to get you back on track, and most importantly, to achieve your goals quickly and carefully?
“My financial position has become more complex so I’m worrying about things I’d rather not have to”
This is another worry advisers hear often. As life goes on, managing money can become more difficult. The pot of money often grows, but so too does the complexity, sometimes quite unnecessarily. And with growing complexity comes growing worry, at least for many.
For a client in this position, a core priority of financial advice is to work out where complexity is serving a purpose, and where it isn’t – then simplify wherever possible ultimately making things easier to manage. Having a trusted adviser in your corner can of course help to alleviate the worry too, as you effectively have someone helping you to manage whatever complexity is necessary or beneficial in your situation.
“I’m paying too much tax”
Tax is obviously critical, and we all wish we could pay less. But many clients are feeling like they are paying more tax than they actually need to, and generally not keeping enough, which means they are making compromises that they’d rather not make. Furthermore, because of the sensitivity around tax, many poor investment decisions have been made purely to reduce tax, without sufficient focus on the underlying investment.
Financial advice helps to identify opportunities where tax outgoings can be minimised while optimising investments. Your adviser will also help to determine what the right amount of tax to pay is, and how you can manage tax outflows more easily.
“The rules are constantly changing so it feels easier to do nothing”
When it comes to money and key financial areas, like super and investment markets, rules and the investing environment do change. These changing goalposts can create a lot of uncertainty and confusion, and the result is that many people feel like it’s easier to do nothing than to work out how to navigate it. We often speak with people who comment that have wanted to “wait until markets settled down” before they start investing.
The reality, of course, is that doing nothing is rarely the best financial decision, so new clients often come for advice when they’ve decided it is time for a change.
Financial advice serves an important role of minimising uncertainty for people in this position. A financial adviser who understands your position and your goals intricately can help to filter some of the noise, so that you only need to focus on rules and changes that are meaningful or material to your position. Additionally, for those changes that are relevant, an adviser can provide some certainty and clarity, helping you to navigate these and make the right decisions.
“I am not motivated by the detail so I’m not doing what I know I should be doing”
Many people are not motivated by the detail, particularly when it comes to finances. As a result, they’re not doing what they know they should be doing to maximise their financial position.
Working with a Financial Adviser is great for clients who don’t want all the unnecessary detail but want to be informed at a level that ensures they retain control and oversight across everything that matters. Ultimately, advice should enable you to achieve your goals, without the worry or distraction of administrative burdens or unmanaged detail.
Of course, every new client comes with a different story and different goals. Advice is never one-size-fits-all, so finding an Adviser who can help get to the core of your specific worries and priorities, who understands your position, and who can then help bridge the gap between where you are and want to be, is crucial.
Meet Mark at Oxlade Financial or Find a Planner near you!
The Money & Life website is operated by the Financial Advice Association (FAAA). The views expressed in this article are those of the author and not those of the FAAA. The FAAA does not endorse or otherwise assume responsibility for any financial product advice which may be contained in the article. Nor does it endorse or assume responsibility for the information.
