facebookFor the average person, is it possible/enough just to engage someone to plan (& execute) your financials for you to retire comfortably or hit your goals? What effort must come from me? - Seedly

Shaun Goh

07 Jun 2019

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SeedlyAMA

For the average person, is it possible/enough just to engage someone to plan (& execute) your financials for you to retire comfortably or hit your goals? What effort must come from me?

Leaving my goals in the hands of my planner. For the average person, is it possible/enough just to engage someone to plan (& execute) your financials for you to retire comfortably / ? What effort must come from me?

AMA Christopher Tan

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Christopher Tan

07 Jun 2019

CEO at Providend Ltd

Hi Shaun, thanks for your question. It is a very good question. My short answer to you is no. Please do not simply leave your finances in the hands of anyone, including financial advisers. As in anything, there are financial advisers and there are financial advisers. There are ethical ones, competent ones, independent ones and there are dishonest ones, incompetent ones and those that are just interested to sell your a product. Furthermore, no one should be more interested in your finances than you. As a guide this is what you can do:

  1. Look for a good adviser. These are the traits that I will look for:

a. Conflict-free - The adviser should either be fee-based or is a salaried-based adviser. This is not to say that all commission-based advisers are bad. It is just that the commission structure creates such great conflict of interest that as a client, you cannot be fully assured that the advice given to you is to your best interest

b. Competent - He should be financially trained, at the least, an associate financial planner (AFP) certified

c. Comprehensive - He should not just advise you and only recommend you say insurance products but is able to advise you holistically covering budgeting, insurance, investments, estate planning. He should also spend sufficient time incorporating national schemes such as CPF, SSBs (things that does not attract a commission for him) into your plan.

d. Team-based - The financial advisory industry is such that many advisers operate very much like an "agent". While there is nothing very wrong with that, the one thing I know after 20 years in practice is that no adviser can be an expert in all areas. Therefore, I will suggest that you look for a financial adviser that comes from a firm that is team-based. By that, I mean that the adviser (being a generalist) is supported by a team of specialists that specializes in different areas of practice such as investments, CPF, insurance, estate and so on. Look for a adviser that comes from a firm that every adviser in the firm uses the same planning methodology, process.

After you have engaged an adviser, I would also strongly recommend that you continue to educate yourself in the areas of personal finance and meet your advisers about once a year to do a review and ask your advisers questions on why certain decisions are taken.

Hope this helps.

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