IS YOUR FINANCIAL ADVISOR VALUE FOR MONEY?

A good financial advisor is invaluable as they can save you money in so many ways and make you money in so many other ways.

A bad financial advisor can cost you a fortune but how do you know? Take for example a client a new client of ours who had a large investment, they were paying fees to an advisor that had not contacted them for over ten years but had earned over £20,000 in fees for doing absolutely nothing. This is now subject of a complaint and a compensation refund in our opinion as this practice is unacceptable.

When did you see your advisor last and are you getting value for any fees paid? Oh are they independent there are so many that are tied to one company, but they don’t like to tell you that for obvious reasons.

A great advisor should be regularly updating you on financial events that affect you and not just passing on investment values of your ISA or Pension. They should be carrying out regular fact finding and risk profiling to ensure your investments are doing what you expect.

Not only this of course but ensuring your estate planning is in order such as avoiding Inheritance Tax and ensuring your estate is going to the right people and not Rachael Reeves. You can safeguard assets in so many ways do you need help with this?

Have you made a will, and did you arrange ‘Tenants in Common’ on the house you own with your partner? Didn’t your advisor cover this? It’s a simple transaction that protects your half of the house but often overlooked and could be very expensive to your loved ones.

You might have life assurance and critical illness cover but is it written in trust so the money goes to the right people, well that what good advisors should be doing for you. There are so many kinds of trusts, so you need to ensure you have the right one.

Then there’s intergenerational planning ensuring your children and grandchildren are aware of what you have so that it’s distributed tax efficiently.

Then of course there the long-term care advice people need to plan for and it’s a subject many advisors ignore for all the wrong reasons.

If you need a second opinion on something call us.