[quote=Chris Hansen]

I've gathered just under 13 mill.

[/quote]

As an indy RIA you could be fine.

$13MM x 1.5% = $195,000 or $16,250 per month

13 million in a year and a half is a helluva track record. Why the heck are you thinking about quitting?

Every one of us can count a dozen times in the first three or four years that we were ready to quit. This is a tough biz. I'd tell you to hang in there but i can't. Maybe you aren't cut out to do this. Still, I will tell you, for me, all the agony was worth it. I've been able to give my family a dream life. A life free from any monetary worry. this biz allowed me to spend a lot more time with my kids as they grew up than anything else i could have done. How much pain is financial freedom worth? Only you can answer that question.

The good news is, from an asset gathering POV, you can do this. Most can't.

Take a breather for a long weekend.  Go to the beach and drink heavily, and come back and take those assholes on again.

[quote=scrim67][

[/quote] I'm in year 3 and well on my way to 40M in assets after year 5.   I"m about 2/3 of the way there right now.

I have never taken a client to dinner or had any client appreciation events.

Are they truly worth the time and expense?

Thanks in advance for any valuable feedback.

scrim

[/quote]

I think they can be. Dinners with clients take you out of the offic and deepen the relationship. Once that happens, they are more apt to introduce you to friends.

I've never done a client appreciation event, but I know a number of big producers who do it every year and tell me they get referrals from it, having clients bring friends.

[quote=Chris Hansen]

I’ve been in the business for about a year and a half. I’ve gathered just under 13 mill. I’m steadily prospecting everyday and have been up to this point. Like many of you, people have been hanging up on me my whole (brief) career, either before I said the name of my firm, or shortly after I presented my product.

While this doesn't offend me, I asked myself a question the other day that I could not answer. The question was - Why do I put up with this garbage? Of course I'm trying to make money, but I'm also providing a valuable service. Why are people so apathetic to guys like us? Why do we put up with it? Then I began thinking...

I'm fairly young, I'm very confident in my understanding of the markets - why do I try to help those who won't let themselves be helped? My current thinking is to leave the business and either earn my CPA designation (probably) or apply for law school.

The point is that I believe I can earn as much, if not more and deal with a different, more palatable form of b.s. as opposed to the ignorance we encounter from people to stupid to realize they are trying to be helped. Plus, I'll never need a broker because I'll handle my own portfolio.

Finally, with my existing book, I have a good friend that is a broker with another firm that I'd recommend my clients move to. After all the money I spent on newspaper ads, mailers, seminars, etc - I'm not going to just let my firm keep these accounts :D.

The one item that is holding me back from proceeding is the prospect of having to pay the firm something to the tune of 100K. I'm sure that can be arbitrated down, but that is a major issue at this point.

Any thoughts?

[quote=Indyone]

Having been in the CPA biz for awhile, I'm baffled why you'd even consider it.  Compared to this business, being a CPA sucks.  You deal with even bigger idiots (IRS and state departments of revenue) and work much harder for the same money.  Everyone is pissed because they owe taxes and that's somehow your fault.  A client decides to hire employees, pays them several checks with no withholding and then decides to tell you about it after year-end.  The list of nonsense accountants deal with is endless and I'm sure that being an attorney is much the same.  Never mind the fact that you can do the work and bill, and you may or may not get paid (unlike this business where you are paid upfront and have zero collection issues).

As others have told you...think long and hard about leaving this business...there will come the day when you'll realize that the replacement career you've chosen is a far bigger piece of sh*t than this business ever was.  You're well on your way to making it and there are thousands of newbies who'd give their left nut to be where you are...don't piss it away.

[/quote]

Everything he said, except insert attorney for CPA.  I know a lot of attorneys, and very few under 50 don't hate their job.  Those who don't are working in smaller towns, or doing government/non-profit work.  They have all made a decision to take less money to improve their lifestyle. 

Attorneys working in bigger firms in the bigger cities (the only ones with less than 20 years experience making any real money) work their asses off to get where they are.  It's different sh*t, but similar in that respect to what we do when we start out.  The difference is that they have to do it for 10 or 20 years, not 5.  Also, even if their name is on the door, if a big client calls you on Friday afternoon and wants something done over the weekend, you are going to apologize to your family and send them to the mountains or beach without you, because you have to work.

As a 1st year associate at a big law firm, your odds of making it as an equity partner are lower than that of a Merrill trainee becoming a million dollar producer.  Smaller firms are easier, but you have to realize you will always be working 40-60 hours a week for less money than your typical experienced broker makes working 30 hours a week.

By the time you graduate from law school to your 80 hr/ week job, you could have made it in this career by now.

give it one more year before you quit. take a short vacation, come back and work harder than you did your first year.

if you leave now you will regret it forever. give it just 1 more year.

good luck

What type of prospecting have you been doing?  I would think at $13 million after only 18 months you could move from the “low impact” (cold call, door-to-door, cold walk business) prospecting.  To a more “high impact” (refers from existing clients, seminars)prospecting.  That alone would cut down on your contact with the ignorant who don’t want or understand  your value.  I would say that you have already done the hardest part of this industry it will only get easier for you.

Good friend of mine is an experienced attorney (15 plus years), but not

partner, at a large regional firm. He is required to book 1800 billable

hours each year, minimum. He also told me to get to partnership

quicker, it needs to be more like 2000-2200. Think about that - about

75% of the hours you work are billable (on average), to compensate for

lunch, meetings, admin work, nose picking, etc. - you NEED to work like

60 hours per week (50 weeks per year) just to hit the billable hours

minimum quota. I don’t know exactly what he makes, but i am guessing

in the $115-140K range. I tell you, after 3-5 years, you could be blowing

that away in half the time he works. Not a bad billable rate.