FAQ
1. When do you meet with clients?
We typically meet with clients on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. Meetings will be held over the Phone, via Zoom, or in person if you live in the Corning, New York, Parrish, Florida, or Valliant, Oklahoma areas. I realize that you’re busy and sometimes it’s hard to meet within these days and times; however, I also believe that you can always make time to meet for something as important as your financial future.
2. Who do you typically work with?
A fair portion of our business is focused on working with small businesses and Attorneys who are early to mid-career. However, we have a growing focus on individuals that want to get their spending plan aligned with their goals and/or those that have student loan debt. Our practice is also designed to serve the women’s segment. However, 74% of our clients are couples. We think that if you’re in a relationship, it’s important to engage in financial planning together. It can be empowering to your relationship to address the topic of money together, and it can also bring confidence to your relationship because you’ll both become clear on where you stand and where you want to go financially.
3. If I’m planning with someone, do we both have to come to the meetings?
Yes. Since financial planning affects both parties involved, we prefer to meet with couples together for every meeting. If your situation is unique, we can address this in our Discovery meeting and decide upon the best course of action.
4. How often do we meet?
In the initial Financial Planning process, we’ll meet for a series of meetings to develop your financial strategy. The first meeting is our financial audit meeting. From there, the number of meetings is based on your need, but at least annual.
5. What are the steps in the financial planning process, again?
a. Discovery meeting
b. Financial Check Up and Goals Setting Meeting
c. Spending Plan Development / Follow Up
d. Targeted Planning Meeting on Risk Management
e. Targeted Planning Meeting on Taxes and retirement planning
f. Targeted Planning Meeting on Investments
g. Review meetings
6. What happens once we’re done with the initial financial planning process?
Once we complete the initial meeting series, we’ll continue meeting with you to update your financial plan and strategy as your life changes. This is the time to address all the changes in your life, amend the plan as needed and continue tracking your progress to hold you accountable toward your financial goals.
7. How do you charge for your financial planning services?
We charge a recurring monthly or quarterly fee for our financial planning services. This allows us to create a solid, comprehensive plan for you to implement at the beginning of our relationship and the opportunity to have quarterly review meetings to update the plan and strategy as needed. Also, we are available to answer any financial planning questions that may arise in between our meetings, which allows you as a client to always feel like you can call or email us at any time.
8. Do I actually get a financial plan?
Yes, as a Financial Planning client you will get a written financial plan. But while the financial plan is important, it is not where the most value comes from. We believe the most value comes from our relationship and your access to me as your personal financial planner—someone who can act as a partner, educator and guide to help you plan out your financial future and work toward your financial goals.
9. Can I call or email you with financial questions at any time?
When you engage in the Financial Planning relationship, you have ongoing access to me via email and telephone so we can help you address any additional questions (within reason, of course!). Should your entire situation change, or should you want to discuss something entirely new, additional fees may be assessed.
10. What if I am not ready for comprehensive financial planning?
That’s OK. The reason for our initial Discovery meeting is to determine if you are ready for comprehensive Financial Planning and if it is a good fit for us to work together. If we discover together that it’s not right for you, we can discuss other services or options that may be a better fit for you.
11. How can I set up a budgeting system that actually works?
We will work together to create a spending plan that identifies all your current income and expenses. We’ll review options to track your income and expenses against the spending plan we create for you.
12. Will you tell me how much I can spend every month?
We will create a spending plan that highlights exactly what you are making and spending every month, and educate you on healthy ratios for your spending. However, we will not tell you what you can spend your money on. That’s your choice. I will show you what you need to do to reach your financial goals so you will be able to make educated decisions on how to spend or save your money every month.
13. How much should I be saving?
We’ll identify how much you will need to save to reach your goals and work together to find the balance between living for today and saving for the future. We encourage clients to aim to save 10-20 percent of their gross income. However, every client is different and at a different stage in life, so we’ll tailor this range based on where you are in life and the financial goals you have.
14. My significant other and I have never planned our finances together. Will you help us find a good system to manage our money together?
Yes. Part of our financial strategy will be developing a system to track income and expenses both as individuals and as a couple. We’ll review the various options you have to manage your money more efficiently as a couple.
15. Will you help me understand my accounts now?
Yes, we will help you understand what’s currently happening in your financial life. This means that we’ll review the types of accounts you have, talk about how to read the financial statements you receive and make sure your accounts are working efficiently and effectively for you and your financial goals. We also want to make sure the type of funds you have saved are diversified, not just the underlying asset allocation.
16. Will you help me set up my bank accounts?
As part of the financial plan, we will review the structure of your current cash accounts and analyze your emergency fund needs. From there, we’ll discuss how you can structure your cash accounts and, if necessary, open up new cash accounts. We will assist in the decision process and educate you on how to open up these new accounts if needed.
17. What if I have debt?
Will you help me with that? Yes, we will help you create a debt management strategy as part of the comprehensive financial plan. From there, if you need additional debt-management services, we will work to connect you to the appropriate professional who can help you further.
18. Do you draft estate documents for me?
No. We are not attorneys, so we do not draft any estate documents. However, we will work with you and an estate planning attorney to help you understand what estate planning documents you may need and educate you on the importance of them and why you need them. We work with a handful of qualified estate planning attorneys and can always refer you to a few who can help you with your estate planning needs.
19. Will you help me apply for insurance?
Yes. As a financial planning client, we’ll get a better understanding of what types of insurance you may need based on your current financial situation and financial goals and recommend the appropriate types of insurance policies to protect yourself, your family and your assets. We refer our clients to Low Load Insurance which offers disability, life and long-term care insurance and other insurance professionals for additional types of insurance policies.
20. Can you help me manage my investments, too?
Yes, we also provide asset management services to our clients.
21. I am clueless about investing. Can you teach me what I need to know?
Yes. Part of my role as a financial planner is to educate you on the importance of financial planning and make recommendations; this includes investing. I’ll educate you on your options to ensure that you’re comfortable making investment decisions. If you’re already investment-savvy, we’ll discuss my investment philosophy and determine if it’s a good fit.
22. How do I start investing?
If you have no investing experience, we’ll help you get started by educating you about your investment options. Within the comprehensive financial planning process, we will define, together, what financial goals you are investing for and create an investment approach that is right for you.
23. What is your investment philosophy?
We believe investment management is an important aspect of the financial planning relationship and view your investments as just a portion of the overall financial plan, not the entire plan. We will help you manage your assets based on your specific financial goals, so it is important to do the work upfront in order to give good investment advice.
24. Do you help me pick my investments for my 401k plan?
We will help you understand the investment philosophy and portfolio allocation you should follow for your 401k account. However, you will need to implement those recommendations.
25. Do you help me with taxes?
Yes, we believe that a big part of financial planning is tax planning. For an additional fee, we will also prepare your taxes for you.