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Oct 18, 2009 3:14 pm

If anyone on the board who is a CFP has truly integrated Financial Planning into their practice, i.e. clients come to them because they want a financial plan, what is your process, how do you start your first meeting, what comes next, etc. If you were strictly and investment guy first, how did you go about transitioning with your existing clients who viewed you as their “investment guy”?

Oct 21, 2009 1:37 am

I was just going to make a new thread about this. awaits responses from the veterans



I was thinking about integrating that to my business, but I figured I’d leave it to the experts and co-brand the plan with my logo.

Oct 21, 2009 3:29 am

Sportsfreakbob, why is your question limited to CFP’s who have integrated financial planning?

Oct 21, 2009 1:04 pm

I am not a CFP nor do I use a FP to lead my business approach.  However, I do use it extensively.  It it great for uncovering all assets, getting the client/prospects to talk about future goals and current financial issues, address debt reduction.  The final product is viewed as an objective guide that shows in black and white what needs to be done…in most cases a change of investment appoach to align with goals.  It positions me as a proffessional who is guided by what is important to the client. after all it was their answers to my questions that provided the data to populate the FP.  Powerfull tool.

Oct 21, 2009 2:45 pm
anonymous:

Sportsfreakbob, why is your question limited to CFP’s who have integrated financial planning?

Oct 22, 2009 1:58 am

Anonymous, you are right, i shouldnt have limited it to CFP's, wasnt really intentional.

Logarithm, what the hell are you talking about?

Oct 22, 2009 4:01 pm

Handle the investments myself and bring in an estate attorney, CPA, and life insurance guy to handle the rest of the FP. Once the FP is done, only one service provider’s name will be on it: mine.

Oct 22, 2009 5:31 pm
NaturaLogarithm:

Handle the investments myself and bring in an estate attorney, CPA, and life insurance guy to handle the rest of the FP. Once the FP is done, only one service provider’s name will be on it: mine.

  Are you allowed to include CPA analysis (i.e. Tax advice) in your financial plans?
Oct 23, 2009 2:17 pm

Probably with a lot of disclosure and the name or firm that made all the recommendations…I’ll have to check with my compliance guy

Nov 4, 2009 4:24 am

I am not a CFP yet (will start process after the new year) but I work with two. They asked me to develope an agenda/timeline to coordinate our planning process and it seems to work well so far. If you are interested then PM me and I will share it to see if it can help you. It should at least give you an idea of where to start.

Nov 15, 2009 5:19 am

Being brand new to the board today, and being that college fb is now finished for the evening, I'll jump in with my two cents here.

To respond to the question regarding how to enter the finacial plan building arena....From interacting with many different advisors in my geographic area, I feel that many investment professionals I know that are trying to compete for the coveted "trusted advisor" title lack a process and a belief system.  For example, many of these brokers manage money and give advice based upon short term market fluctations and short term thinking. Sometimes I think that they are as indecesive and flip flop as much as their clients would if they managed their own money. I also feel like some of these professionals are giving advice without even knowing what the client is trying to accomplish or understanding the complete picture.  An investor risk profile does not qualifying as understanding your client. My humble opinion is that if you want to build someone's financial plan you need to know, really know, more about that client than anyone else, other than their spouse.  Not understanding the complete picture is like a doctor making recommendations without doiing a thorough physical....it's malpractice.   So my thoughts are that you have to have processes, firm beliefs, and organized and repeatable systems to enter into the world of financial plan building.  My process is simply, I use several meetings to understand the client throughly.  I ask a lot of tough questions during these meetings, and want to understand their thoughts and feelings about the future.  They can fax me the facts, they can't fax me their feelings.    After that, I then utilize Emoney 360 planning software to integrate their whole financial life onto "one pain of glass".  This software is a key compenent of my process because it serves as the physical as well as interactive financial plan itself.  I believe in the"financial planning pyramid" in that I make sure all my clients risk management needs are met prior to addressing investments.  How can I talk about investing for a goal that's 20 years out when this poor guy doesn't even have 5 months of living expenses in cash or disability insurance in place.  Then, through proper asset allocation we take only as much risk as we need to in order to reach or exceed their objectives.  I meet so many clients whose investment accounts are way riskier than they need to be to get them to where they want to go.  I design efficient portfolio's that maximize return while minimizing risk.  Finally, once that client enters their retirement years I want to use monte carlo analysis and cash flow analysis to ensure that we're designing workable retirement distribution solutions so that their money lasts as long as they do.   I hope this adds a little value at least to this post.  
Nov 15, 2009 11:01 pm

CFP83

Good post, thanks. When you sit down with a prospect for the first time, are you sitting there with a legal pad, or do you use questionnaire's or any other tools. Other than the basic questions, like where do you want to be in 10 years, what kind of retirement are you looking for and have you thought about how much you will need to achieve it, etc, are there any other questions that stand out in your mind that you ask, which mighyt be less obvious, but just as important?
Nov 16, 2009 12:55 am

Sportsfreak, your question isn’t addressed to me, but that’s never stopped me. 

As an advisor, I think that a questionairre is pretty necessay.   It's just that with experience comes a memorization of what needs to be asked, so the questionairre can become a blank piece of paper. 
Nov 16, 2009 2:29 am

[quote=anonymous]Sportsfreak, your question isn’t addressed to me, but that’s never stopped me. 

As an advisor, I think that a questionairre is pretty necessay.   It's just that with experience comes a memorization of what needs to be asked, so the questionairre can become a blank piece of paper.  [/quote]

I think you need to be careful about not having a paper factfinder.  I saw a presentation on factfinding by a guy at our company on the East Coast, he's an MDRT Court of the Table Producer and he said he always uses some sort of written fact-finder, not because he needs to, but because he found that when he didn't prospects were concerned he didn't have a process.

I would encourage everyone to use a written fact finder, especially if you're a younger <40  advisor.
Nov 16, 2009 2:49 am

[quote=BerkshireBull] [quote=anonymous]Sportsfreak, your question isn’t addressed to me, but that’s never stopped me. 

As an advisor, I think that a questionairre is pretty necessay.   It's just that with experience comes a memorization of what needs to be asked, so the questionairre can become a blank piece of paper.  [/quote]

I think you need to be careful about not having a paper factfinder.  I saw a presentation on factfinding by a guy at our company on the East Coast, he's an MDRT Court of the Table Producer and he said he always uses some sort of written fact-finder, not because he needs to, but because he found that when he didn't prospects were concerned he didn't have a process.

I would encourage everyone to use a written fact finder, especially if you're a younger <40  advisor.
[/quote] Very good points. IBut have always had a hard time using a fact finder, or questionairre, that didnt put me in a position of feeling like i am interrogating a prospect. Does anyone have a fact finder that they are comfortable with that they would be willing to post, or PM? 
Nov 16, 2009 2:56 am

The client fills out the questionnaire before they get to me. I’ll dig a little deeper once I meet with them.

Nov 16, 2009 3:28 am

I have a cliffsnotes version I made from the Checklist our clients fill out before the data gathering meeting. I print it off front and back of two pages. I tried to post it but it takes up too much room and will not format correctly. I will try to PM it to you.</O:P>

Nov 16, 2009 11:26 am

[quote=BerkshireBull] [quote=anonymous]Sportsfreak, your question isn’t addressed to me, but that’s never stopped me. 

As an advisor, I think that a questionairre is pretty necessay.   It's just that with experience comes a memorization of what needs to be asked, so the questionairre can become a blank piece of paper.  [/quote]

I think you need to be careful about not having a paper factfinder.  I saw a presentation on factfinding by a guy at our company on the East Coast, he's an MDRT Court of the Table Producer and he said he always uses some sort of written fact-finder, not because he needs to, but because he found that when he didn't prospects were concerned he didn't have a process.

I would encourage everyone to use a written fact finder, especially if you're a younger <40  advisor.
[/quote] The clients will be concerned about a lack of process if you don't tell them your process.  It has nothing to do whether the  fatct finder has questions pre-printed on it.
Nov 16, 2009 11:28 am

The problem with most fact finder questionairre’s is that they focus on facts.  At the very least, one needs to focus on goals first and then circle back to get the facts.

Nov 16, 2009 12:37 pm

Exactly anon.  To me, the fact finder give you a place to start.  Kind of a snapshot of where they are. It doesn’t tell you where they want to go.

More often than not, they don’t.  You must dig deeper to find not only the “what”, but the “why”.  They don’t understand the why.  Once you get them to articulate it, it works so much better.

It’s a pain in the neck, but it works.  Can’t wait till I don’t have to deal with clients anymore.