Growing Your Financial Advisory Practice | Insights for Financial Advisors, Planners and Investment Managers

What’s the best way to offer financial advice to business-minded clients? For starters, it helps to be clear on what it means to be a business owner yourself. Today’s guest has taken serious steps to develop himself as an entrepreneur, which helps him work with his own clients, most of whom are business owners. 

Dustin Serviss of Serviss Wealth Management has been featured as the number 1 Top 40 Under 40 leader in 2014 by the Kelowna Chamber of Commerce. In 2017, Serviss Wealth Management was awarded the Top 10 Wealth Builder Award by its previous investment dealer (consisting of over 800 advisors). Serviss Wealth Management was also voted one of the Top 3 Micro Businesses in Kelowna by the Kelowna Chamber of Commerce in 2018.

Listen in to hear how Dustin helps business owners manage their wealth – and their businesses. 

What You’ll Learn in This Episode: 

Links and Resources: 

Serviss Wealth Management 

Quotes by Dustin Serviss:  

“Now when we are going and talking to clients, we are talking on a level that is business-minded first, financial planning second.” 

“When you’re exposed to bigger stuff you realize that other people think differently than you do.”

“As entrepreneurs, we have a lot of good ideas and we have even more great ideas… And before you know it, you’ve got so many things to do, so many processes, so many touchpoints, so many this, so many that.”

Serving business owners and lawyers, Serviss Wealth Management is a powerhouse of an independent financial planning firm. Acting as the quarterback (as he puts it) for his clients’ financial affairs, and taking his own entrepreneurship very seriously, Dustin has a lot to share about the business side of financial planning.

Below, we’re sharing three key ideas from this episode:

Two years ago, Dustin decided that he wanted to rewrite his business plan. And he certainly didn’t do it half way.

Instead, he hired a consultant, James, to work with him over the course of an entire year. Together, they looked at all aspects of the business and decided on a new path forward. Read on for Dustin’s three main takeaways.

Hint: For more on the importance of having a business plan, listen to our episode with Chris Paterson on the major drivers of advisors’ business growth.

All advisors know the importance of a talented professional who can help challenge clients and help them reach their goals. And that’s not just true for clients in need of financial services.

Dustin half jokes that every business owner should work with two professionals: a therapist and a business consultant. And in essence, the two are similar. There are very few people whom you can count on to ask the hard questions and help you overcome your ego.

This is critical in both the personal and professional spheres. Dustin recommends finding a professional (or two) to help you challenge your beliefs and get you out of your comfort zone.

Since Dustin works primarily with business owners, getting a clearer sense of what it means to be a business owner himself was invaluable. Now, he can work with his clients confident in his own approach and skills as an entrepreneur.

As he puts it, “now when we are going and talking to clients, we are talking on a level that is business-minded first, financial planning second.”

Entrepreneurs tend to have a lot of ideas, and they’re all great (or at least that’s what we like to believe). It’s so easy to add great ideas on top of one another, layering on and layering on.

The problem, as Dustin puts it, is that “before you know it, you’ve got so many things to do, so many processes, so many touchpoints, so many this, so many that. It’s so hard to train new staff, it’s so hard to keep going myself.”

James helped Dustin cut the baggage – so much that it was a bit scary to Dustin. But by asking what clients actually value in the relationship, they were able to shift the focus to the important things and shed the rest.

Hint: If you’re curious, the lesson was that Dustin’s clients didn’t care so much about all the checking in and the birthday cards – and maybe this is true for your clients, too. Instead, they just wanted timely and satisfying responses to their questions. As a result, Dustin and his team focus on getting back to people within 24 hours whenever possible.

Dustin’s approach to leading is all about transparency – probably more than what many leaders would be comfortable with.

For over five years now, he has shared all the numbers of his business with his staff. They know how much each revenue source brings in, what the expenses are – everything.

When Dustin hired James to help him with the business plan, the whole office got involved. James would come into the office for a couple hours every two weeks to discuss different aspects of the business with everyone on the team.

Dustin believes this is important because it allows his staff to help make decisions and drive the company culture. Having them involved in the process means that everyone feels that they have ownership – each one of them, after all, is a stakeholder in the business.

Dustin attributes his success in the industry to two things, and they both show how invested he is in learning:

Whether it’s through a set curriculum or from experts in the field, Dustin’s dedication to learning what he could from others early in his career set him up for success later on.

For more advice from Dustin, listen to the full episode where he shares how he manages the different aspects of his business, how he offers even more value through a consulting service, and more. You can find the show right here on this page or subscribe on iTunes or Stitcher so you don’t miss any episodes. 

And to get new episodes directly to your inbox, sign up for our mailing list below.

For many families, the wealth-building process is one that crosses several generations. It’s just not always easy to keep everyone on the same page. However, the benefits of building on family values and past lessons is a huge advantage that family businesses can tap into.

Jamie Townsend is an advisor who recently completed his designation in the Family Enterprise Advisor (FEA) program, which focuses on helping families manage their greatest asset through continuity. Jamie works with business owners and professionals to help simplify their financial lives. He was recently recognized by Wealth Professional Magazine for his work as a Top 50 Advisor in Canada.

Listen in to hear what Jamie has to say about the challenges that family businesses face, the best ways to help, and the part of financial advising where shortcuts just won’t cut it. 

What You’ll Learn in This Episode: 

Links and Resources:

Lawton Partners Wealth Management 

Quotes by Jamie Townsend: 

“We are able to have an incredible impact on people when it matters most.” 

“If you think about this conversation in terms of generations, you have the next generation coming up with their own energy, their own ideas, their own goals. And sometimes those align perfectly with the generation above, and sometimes they’re completely different.” 

“When you spend time with someone, if they’re ultimately going to work with you, they need to get to know you, they need to like you, and then eventually they start to trust you.”

Jamie Townsend is well-versed in family business. Not only does he run a practice with his dad, but also between the two of them, they’ve worked with some families over as many as four generations. Don’t miss out on learning from his unique perspective. 

Below, we’re sharing three key ideas from this episode:

For the rest of the episode, find the podcast on iTunes or Stitcher, or hit the link above.

Jamie’s opportunity to work with several generations of the same family has given him a unique perspective on wealth-building over decades, not just months or years.

For him, wealth building “is not a conversation that is a three month conversation or a six month conversation... It is this process of doing the right thing, following the right principles. And then you get to see the cumulative impact.”

As you might expect, the effect of compounding is especially evident over many decades. But it’s not only the dollars that have a chance to grow.

When you have a business over several generations, “it’s not just the bricks and mortars of a business that can be passed on… but it is also what the family stands for, the lessons that they have learned.”

The true impact comes from passing on the knowledge of running a sustainable business and working toward a common goal over decades. When families are able to work together in this way — something that Jamie helps them do — they gain an advantage that many businesses lack.

When asked what has made Jamie’s practice so successful, he balks a bit at the word “success.” It’s an uncomfortable word for him because, he says, “it sometimes means that it’s a finite moment.”

Rather than feeling like there’s a point where he’s finally made it and can now coast on his own success, he feels like his firm is always continuing to grow, always just beginning to reach a new level. This perspective has made him relentlessly pursue new ways to add value for clients.

For example, he’s brought people with different skill sets and designations to the team; as long as they share the same fundamental values, different skills mean a better-rounded service for clients. He’s also found ways to create efficiencies and introduced services to help clients with valuing and running their own businesses.

And most of all, he’s done the one thing you can’t automate, or speed up, or mimic: the process of getting to know his clients, always doing his best for them, and earning their trust in the process.

Jamie’s single-minded focus on creating value for clients means that he wants to spend as much time as possible with them — and the way he sees it, time marketing to new clients just gets in the way.

Rather than meeting new people, he’d rather spend his hours serving the clients he already has. He’s seen that when advisors take on too many clients, they don’t have the opportunity to get to know them and create real impact on their lives, meaning that their business is more transactional than relational.

Jamie is so concentrated on his current network of clients that a few years ago, he and his team decided to begin accepting clients by referral only. That means that they’ll only take on someone who has been specifically referred by a current client.

This exclusivity may seem risky, but Jamie has found that it pays off. He’s able to spend more face-to-face time making sure his clients can ask lots of questions and understand everything that’s going on with their money. He and his team also come up with new ideas to add value — like hosting client-only events with guest speakers to help them learn more about finance and business.

Hint: Many of the things Jamie does for clients don’t directly earn him money; for example, he’s currently looking at new ways to help clients make better evidence-based business decisions. However, any value he creates for clients helps his relationship with them — and therefore his business — in the long run.

The benefit of spending so much time serving clients and providing them with value is that, inevitably, the clients can’t help but talk about the service to their friends. And they do introduce Jamie to new, similar, clients who also want the same thing.

Of course, this isn’t something a new advisor can do right from the beginning. It takes time to build up the trust and the clientele, and momentum builds slowly over many years. Still, the lesson of focusing on current clients is a valuable one whether or not you’re marketing yourself to new clients.

Hint: For more on why providing value to current clients is just as important as seeking out new clients — if not more so — listen to Episode 33: The 1-Page Marketing Plan for Your Financial Advisory Practice with Allan Dib.

To hear more from Jamie, make sure you catch the full episode where he talks about the most challenging part of growing his practice, the opportunities out there for new advisors, and more. You can find the show right here on this page or subscribe on iTunes or Stitcher so you don’t miss any episodes. 

And to get new episodes directly to your inbox, sign up for our mailing list below.

How does charitable giving factor into wealth management? How can you help your clients pursue their charitable goals and earn great financial returns? Today’s guest has mastered helping clients balance their finances with their values—something that most financial advisors aren’t doing because they’re not taking the time to even understand their clients’ goals.

Ryan Fraser is a nationally known Planned Giving expert. His firm, Quiet Legacy, helps individuals incorporate their personal values into their financial planning experience. Ryan is a past president of the Estate Planner Council of London and a past chair of the Canadian Association of Gift Planners (CAGP) London Roundtable. He has served extensively in leadership positions on boards and committees of numerous not-for-profit organizations including the Brain Tumour Foundation of Canada, London Heritage Council, Trillium Plus Music and Letters and many others.

Listen in to hear what Ryan has to say about how his firm serves clients, how to balance personal values with financial returns, and what is most misunderstood about charitable giving.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode::

Links and Resources:

Quiet Legacy Planning Group

Canadian Association of Gift Planners (CAGP)

CAGP Conference

Ted Talk: The Way We Think About Charity is Dead Wrong (Dan Pallotta)

Quotes by Ryan Fraser:

“Before we have the numbers conversation, we’ve had some really deep conversations about what are the motivating factors in their lives and what are the things in their past that led these values to be really strong for them.”

“The thought that the most important thing to a client wasn’t the return is not something our industry ever contemplates.”

“I like to joke that my underlying business plan is I don’t want to deal with jerks.”

For some time now, Ryan’s career has been partly in the not-for-profit world and partly in financial services. His current practice, Quiet Legacy, is the perfect blend of the two: about 30% of his firm’s time is spent working with charities, including audits of their charitably owned life insurance policies, and talks on planned giving for their donors amongst other services. The other 70% is helping individuals with wealth management, insurance and financial planning.

Below, we’re sharing three key ideas from this episode:

For the rest of the episode, find the podcast on iTunes or Stitcher, or hit the link above.

Quiet Legacy gets its name from the clientele the firm serves— the people Ryan calls the “quiet millionaires next door.” These are people who want to make charitable giving part of their financial and estate planning. They have saved up significant resources, live modestly, and are serious about sharing their wealth.

The obvious demographic here, of course, is the 60+ crowd. And they do make up a significant portion of Ryan’s clients.

But Ryan also works with a lot of professionals in their late 30s and early 40s. Like the 60-year-olds, they feel that the welfare of the world and the people around them is of utmost importance. And they’re people who want to act on these values.

And yet, these younger consumers have a hard time finding professionals who are willing to help them incorporate charity into their financial planning because they don’t fit the expected demographics for major charitable giving. Many advisors pick their niche around a certain age, marital status or career, so they’re ignoring clients who could otherwise be a great fit.

Ryan’s niche is based more around so-called tribal, or purpose-drive, marketing. He finds people with similar outlooks rather than similar physical or social characteristics, and he’s built his practice around them.

Another way in which Ryan’s niche is underserved is the assumption that returns are the most important thing to clients.

And sure, there are consumers who care most about returns. But for clients in Ryan’s target market, money is a tool, not the goal itself, and they want to use it according to their values.

Ryan recalls meeting one of his largest clients when she hired him for hourly fee-for-service planning. Early in Ryan’s conversation with her, it came up that she’s a stringent environmentalist and very concerned about the environmental impact of the oil industry.

Looking at her portfolio, however, Ryan noticed that 37% of her existing portfolio was invested in the oilsands. When he pointed this out, she immediately engaged Ryan to manage her assets. No one had ever bothered to discuss her values with her and show her how she can align her investments with them.

This is really a case in point for the importance of getting to know your clients and understanding what drives them.

Sure, it can be difficult to model a financial plan that makes use of various charitable strategies. And yes, your AUM may decrease when you help your clients give their money away. However, Ryan is confident that you easily make up for any additional effort or risk through the deep relationship you build with your clients when you help them use their money to reach their actual goals—not just a certain rate of return.

Hint: To hear more about charitable giving and estate planning, listen to How to Successfully Prevent Clients’ Biggest Mistakes around Estate Planning with Bill Green.

A lot of people are concerned about charities’ expense ratios—and for good reason. A commonly cited truism states that no more than 25% of a charity’s expenses should be in administration, with the rest directly spent on delivering services.

But Ryan has a more nuanced way of looking at this. First of all, a food bank is not the same thing as say, a not-for-profit museum or a hospital foundation, and they all have different expenses with different administrative needs. It’s not fair to compare them against each other.

Secondly, people seem to expect charities to do things that most successful businesses can’t do. According to Mark C. Tibergien and Rebecca Pomering in their book Practice Made Perfect, the most effective financial advisory practices have a 44% profit margin; when you hit around that point, there’s not much you can do to optimize beyond it.

A 25% expense ratio is a 300% profit margin. If we expect a 44% profit margin from financial service professionals, why do we expect a 300% profit margin for charities? We expect businesses to make investments to increase revenue, but balk when charities do the same. However, if investing more in staff can make a charity reach more donors, raise more money and provide more services, why shouldn’t they do it?

If a charity has an expense ratio similar to, or ideally slightly lower than, other similar organizations, it’s a sign they’re likely on the right track, no matter what that exact ratio is.

Hint: Watch out for charities with unusually low expense ratios, too. It might mean that they’re underpaying and overworking their staff, which your clients probably don’t want to support.

For more advice from Ryan, make sure you catch the full episode where he covers topics like his methods for uncovering clients’ values and why it’s critical to calculate the cost of serving a client (plus how to do it). You can find the show right here on this page or subscribe on iTunes or Stitcher so you don’t miss any episodes.

And to get new episodes directly to your inbox, sign up for our mailing list below.

Compliance has a bad rap in the financial services industry, but today’s guest has a unique perspective. Now a compliance officer, he actually started his career in the financial services industry as an advisor, so he understands exactly how compliance affects—and can even improve—your business. He’s also passionate about helping advisors run their own independent practices while staying compliant. 

Joining the podcast today is Eric Wachtel. Eric is the national chief compliance officer for IDC WIN where he is responsible for maintaining and strengthening IDC WIN’s compliance programs and initiatives. He has 24 years of experience in the life insurance industry and has worked steadily to build IDC WIN’s compliance programs while maintaining a pro-business environment.

Eric is also the compliance chair of Legislative Affairs for the Canadian Association of Independent Life Brokerage Agencies (CAILBA) where he participates in numerous insurance industry working groups and committees which help shape the direction of compliance in the life insurance industry. 

What You’ll Learn in This Episode: 

Links and Resources: 

Email Eric

Call Eric at: 905-366-3866 EXT#3228 

Quotes by Eric Wachtel:

“Good compliance equals good production and good service to consumers.”

“I tell advisors to resist the temptation to take your template, customize it, get it done, then throw it in a drawer and don’t look at it for a year. Because that is a pitfall.”

“Compliance these days is synonymous with professionalism.”

Historically, there has been a lot of angst around compliance because advisors haven’t been clear on what exactly they have to do. That’s because insurance compliance is principles-based (rather than rules-based like securities), which can lead to ambiguity and uncertainty. But Eric is here to share the exact steps you need to take to be compliant and have peace of mind.

Hint: If you’d like to hear more about compliance in wealth management, listen to our episode with Jamie List where he explains how high service standards make compliance a cinch.

Below, we’re sharing three key ideas from this episode:

For the rest of the episode, find the podcast on iTunes or Stitcher, or hit the link above.

In order to run your practice correctly, there are three manuals Eric says you need to have that demonstrate your understanding of, and processes around, anti-money laundering, privacy, and general compliance.

Hint: The client files also don’t need to have each step separate—you might have documentation that covers a few steps in one go, and that’s fine.

Contrary to how some people talk about it, compliance is not just a necessary evil. In reality, every piece of the required client files benefits both you and the client.

For instance, if there’s ever a claim against you, you can have peace of mind knowing that you’ve met all of the regulations and have a clear way to defend yourself.

But more importantly, being compliant has the double duty of providing excellent service to your clients. For example, making expectations clear from the beginning quells misunderstandings before they happen and avoids conflict later on in the relationship—which is ideal for everyone. 

Similarly, the Reason Why letter reminds clients of unmet needs that you can help them with in the future and invites them to be in touch if they have questions. This helps clients move away from a transactional, one-and-done approach to insurance and keeps the business relationship going.

And having a solid privacy regime means that your clients can trust you to keep their most private information safe. 

Moreover, your clients, whatever industry they happen to be in, are likely used to compliance and are themselves experiencing a surge in regulation in their field. Clients will respect that you have a process that you follow and that you take their business seriously. As Eric puts it, “compliance these days is synonymous with professionalism.”

To learn more from Eric, like why you’ll be hearing a lot more about fair treatment of consumers in the near future and why compliance needs to be part of your weekly process, catch the full episode right here on this page or subscribe to the show on iTunes or Stitcher.

The conflicts of interest within embedded compensation models are well known, but how can you actually get away from it and maintain a stable and comfortable revenue stream? Today’s guest mastered his business’ transition to a fee-based model, and he’s on a mission to share what he’s learned with other advisors. 

Adam Chapman is a native of London, Ontario, where his practice is currently located. He completed his B.ACS at Western University, back when it was UWO, and has added his CFP and CLU designations since starting his business back in 2005.

Adam focuses on retirees and people who are about to retire. He's paired this niche audience with a business model that has him focused on switching his services over to an almost exclusively fee-based and fee-for-service offering in the next one to two years. 

What You’ll Learn in This Episode: 

Links and Resources: 

Email Adam 

Quotes by Adam Chapman: 

“It didn’t seem fair that I have to take a pay cut just to do what’s right for the client.” 

“That fear of running out is what prevents people from using the money.” 

“If we can help clients step out of their comfort zone a couple times in retirement and do something they never thought they could ever do, that’s phenomenally motivating and powerful for me.”

Over the last three years, Adam has entirely switched his practice over to being 100% fee-based. This unique experience, along with his insight into the psychology of retirement, has brought advisors to him asking for advice about running their own fee-based practices; today, he’s sharing these insights with you.

Below, we’re covering three key ideas from this episode:

About five years ago, Adam became frustrated with his commission-based compensation. Since he works with retirees, he was helping clients take money out of their accounts to spend, but his compensation was supposed to come from selling products— which at this point in their lives, his clients often didn’t need.

“It didn’t seem fair that I have to take a pay cut just to do what’s right for the client,” he says. So he quit cold-turkey, and in the last three years, he switched to his business being 100% fee-based.

While he expected to lose some income through the transition, that hasn’t actually been the case. For one thing, his clients seemed much happier once he educated them about how the fee helped him remove bias from the equation.

His client engagement also increased significantly. In the past, his clients would sit on their questions, not wanting to call him to ask and risk being a bother. Instead, it would all come out in an annual review meeting, at which point it would be too much to address all at once.

Now that clients see the fees they pay him, they feel more comfortable reaching out to him more often—the fee raised the level of engagement and spurred more referrals, which actually made his revenue increase and become more stable.

While Adam has found great success with his compensation change, there are certain pitfalls you should take care to avoid.

This is all about confidence; if you don’t understand and acknowledge the value you provide to clients, you’ll have a hard time charging them what you’re worth.

Niching down helps—people are much more willing to spend money on expertise rather than general financial advice. Concentrating on retirees and soon-to-be retirees increased Adam’s confidence, helping him feel like his offerings were worth what he charges.

Hint: To get a sense of what his clients would experience with his new pay structure, Adam hired a business coach and paid the same fees that his highest net worth clients would be paying him. This helped him understand what it means to get value for that kind of money.

Giving clients too many choices can muddy the waters and cause both them and you to overanalyze the options.

Instead, Adam offers the exact same services to all of his clients, even though he charges them different amounts based on their portfolio.

How can you justify charging clients different fees for the same work?

Keep in mind that you’re charging your clients based on what it’s worth to them. Your services have a higher impact on a higher net worth client than on someone who has a lower net worth (who is paying less money, but perhaps a higher portion of their income). When you think about value for the client, it makes sense that some pay more for the same service.

While it’s not the same as embedded commission, an hourly rate still has an element of conflict of interest—the client would obviously love to pay less while you might prefer to spend more time on their plan so that you earn more money. Hourly rates are also not a good measurement of the value you provide.

Instead, Adam recommends figuring out your operating costs to determine what your breakeven cost per client needs to be so that you can keep the lights on and pay yourself and your staff. That will help give you an idea of the minimum you need to charge to provide the service you offer.

While many people expect retirement to be a smooth and seamless transition into bliss, that’s not the experience of most retirees. For this reason, Adam insists on speaking frankly with his clients about the realities of retirement to help his clients prepare.

It’s easy to forget that retirement is a time of loss—the loss of structure and camaraderie when leaving the workplace, to start. In Adam’s experience, it can take three to five years for someone to settle comfortably into retirement. And later in life comes further loss of family, friends, and spouse. It’s critical to be aware of—and prepare for—these coming changes.

Hint: Recognizing a need in his niche, Adam decided to receive training in bereavement and palliative care. Consider the needs of the clients you serve and whether you can get additional training in divorce, entrepreneurship, or whatever else might be relevant to the clients who make up your nice.

Because people tend to be quite worried about having enough money in retirement, Adam has noticed that most of his clients are actually saving more than they need to retire comfortably.

And that transition—from accumulating to decumulating—takes some getting used to. Adam wants his clients to get used to it sooner than later so they don’t regret not spending their money, on themselves or on their family, later in life.

He helps clients focus on what really matters to them: getting value out of what they’ve saved in the form of a lifestyle they can enjoy. Sure, he worries about things like rate of return and tax savings, but that’s in the background—the explicit goal is to help them make the most of what they’ve earned and saved.

Hint: For another perspective on retirement income planning, listen back to our episode with Howard Dixon on the art and science of retirement income planning.

Personally, Adam’s goal is to get his clients to step out of their comfort zones at least a few times in their retirement; he wants them to get uncomfortable—whether that means paying for a Disney cruise for the whole family or a treat just for themselves—because those are always the experiences his clients cherish the most.

To learn more from Adam, including why retirees are his perfect fit as clients, why he’s not too concerned about growing his business too quickly, and more, make sure you catch the full episode. You can find the show here on this page, or subscribe on iTunes or Stitcher so you don’t miss any episodes.

And to get new episodes directly to your inbox, sign up for our mailing list below.

Estate planning can cause rising tensions within a family. It’s not necessarily that people don’t know what needs to be done (though that can be an issue, too); it’s that the decisions are emotional and often difficult to think about.

So how can you make the process as painless as possible for your clients and help them start the conversations that will make things easier for them and their families down the road? This is what today’s guest, Bill Green, tackles in today’s episode.

Bill is a Certified Financial Planner, Financial Management Advisor, and Chartered Financial Divorce Specialist. With over 29 years of experience in the industry, he holds his Chartered Investment Manager designation and is a member of the Nazrudin project, an international advisory think-tank. Bill is the author of two books and now works as a fee-only financial planner on an hourly basis, largely offering second opinions and financial plans for other advisors’ clients.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

Links and Resources:

Bill Green

The Success Tax Shuffle

I Am… Three Little Words from A to Z

“Just because something worked for somebody doesn’t mean it will work for you.”

“We are stewards for our economy and stewards for the people out there who aren’t as fortunate as some other people, and I think that the people that have the money should share with the charities that are out there.”

“We all go to school and get an education, but they teach us how to get a job. They don’t teach us how to manage money.”

With nearly 30 years of experience in the financial services industry, Bill has the experience — and plenty of great anecdotes — to help dig into estate planning and the joys of pure financial planning.

Below, we’re sharing three key ideas from this episode:

For the rest of the episode, find the podcast on iTunes or Stitcher, or hit the link above.

The biggest mistake Bill sees clients making in their estate and tax planning is approaching issues with a one-size-fits-all mindset.

Often, people get most of their financial advice from two sources:

The problem with these kinds of advice is that they’re generic. And in financial planning, advice specific to the client is key.

Even relying on the advice of just one professional isn’t a good idea. A lawyer will give a legal opinion while an accountant will give an accounting opinion; ideally, people should speak with both to get a well-rounded perspective.

Or better yet, they should work with a financial planner — who might not know all the answers, but who can certainly see the bigger picture and connect them with the right professionals who can help.

While you can’t control the types of misinformation your clients will come across as they move through the world, you can help them avoid making costly mistakes based on that misinformation.

As Bill puts it, “the job is to educate them and hold their hand.” And that takes some work.

The first part of educating is really listening. In order to hear and accept that you have a better approach, your clients need to know that you actually hear them, especially if they’re really interested in or scared about something that they heard from a friend or radio show host.

For example, Bill has seen a lot of people worried about probate; and while it certainly can be a concern, he’s found that it’s not actually what they should be focusing on the most when planning their estates. But since the prospect of someone’s will being questioned or challenged can be frightening, he’ll always start by hearing out the client’s concern first.

Next, Bill loves giving real-life examples of scenarios he’s seen with past clients — the pitfalls of joint ownership, tax bills being triggered that shouldn’t have been, and OES clawbacks because people did something at the wrong time.

He can explain to his clients how he’s personally seen the issues that the capital gains tax and deferred tax liability have caused when people have not adequately taken taxes into account. These personal stories hit home much easier than statistics or facts and help him explain important concepts in a way that clients can understand.

Bill’s favourite way of avoiding huge taxes on clients’ estates is through charitable donations. Where do you think your clients would prefer their money go — to the CRA or to their favourite charitable cause?

And from Bill’s perspective, there’s no upper limit — “the bigger the donation, the better.”

It’s a piece of estate planning that is often forgotten; lots of people make annual donations or give when someone knocks on their door, but they don’t think about the ways they can leave something behind to the causes they love. And as a bonus, donations can significantly help reduce tax liability.

Hint: Encourage clients to get their families involved in setting up a charitable donor fund and get them to decide together where the money goes. It teaches strong values and helps their family better understand their wishes and goals for the money.

Bill is particularly fond of in-kind donations, especially when the amount is over $1,000. Help clients identify a share in their portfolio that’s had a big capital gain and suggest they donate that in kind to offset tax liability.

Consider using an asset that has appreciated a lot — particularly a T-SWP or T-Class (depending on the provider), which allows an investor to withdraw up to a certain percentage of their capital as a return of capital resulting in little to no tax paid on distributions. Then they can donate that investment in-kind which eliminates all capital gains so the charity avoids paying any tax on the donation received.

It’s also important to remember that donations made in a client’s estate can be carried back to the year prior to death to get back taxes that have already been paid — Bill has even seen cases of clients able to eliminate all of their tax liability through donations (and have money to leave to their families).

Hint: To hear more on this topic, listen to our episode on estate planning according to clients’ values with Sterling Rempel.

For more helpful advice from Bill, catch the full episode and hear about the large family meetings he facilitates for his clients, how he combats the misperception that hiring a financial planner is too expensive, and more. You can find the show right here on this page or subscribe on iTunes or Stitcher so you don’t miss any episodes.

The vast majority of consumers, other than those in the high net worth segment, will only ever know about investing in the public market. However, alternative investments can diversify a portfolio and help it withstand typical volatilities. Today’s guest explains how and why she decided to make private investments available to all of her clients.

Janea graduated from the University of Saskatchewan with a degree in Marketing, then decided to start her own financial advisory firm in 2008. She started as a personal financial advisor offering independent insurance and investment product, but after obtaining her CFP in 2012, she decided to drop her mutual funds license and become a private wealth advisor with Raintree Financial Solutions.

Janea is listed as a top advisor within her investment dealer and her managing general agency, she has been nominated for the Women in Wealth Management Young Gun of the Year Award, and received the Saskatchewan Award of Merit for Business Leadership in 2016.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

Links and Resources:

Janae Dieno

Brightrock Financial

Finding the Money to Fund Financial Planning Webinar Registration

Quotes by Janea:

“All my friends are, you know, buying gas and cigarettes and trying to get booze and I’m opening an RRSP. Ok, sounds good.”

“You really have to go through... educating them on the fact that investments don’t just end with stocks, mutual funds, bonds, and GICs. There’s a whole other world out there of investments.”

“If you’re willing to kind of pull up your socks and do a little bit of hard work in the beginning, growing your book organically I think has so much more meaning because then you really get to work with the clients you want to work with.”

Janea Dieno always had an interest in finance — first from listening to her father and uncle talk about it at the kitchen table, and then at the age of 16 when her uncle helped her open her first RRSP account. She’s now owned her own practice for 11 years, and considering that she’s “never done anything easy in [her] life,” she has a lot of lessons to share from her experience.

Below, we’re sharing three key ideas from this episode:

For the rest of the episode, find the podcast on iTunes or Stitcher, or hit the link above.

Soon after earning her CFP, when Janea was a few years into running her practice (not to mention expecting her first child with her new husband), she made the unusual decision to drop her mutual funds license.

At the time, she owned a home and a rental property that she and her husband were managing themselves.

Janea recognized the importance of having investments outside of the public market, but being on call 24 hours a day for her tenants was getting exhausting. She was looking for a better way to diversify her portfolio and invest in real estate and different asset classes without actually having to own a property.

She realized that mutual funds couldn’t offer everything she wanted in her own portfolio. That’s what led her to explore alternative investments in the first place. And once she saw how useful they were to her, she wanted people like her clients — most of whom are in the $100,000 to $3 million range — to have access to these investment opportunities, too.

Janea found Raintree Financial Solutions — a private capital market dealer — to be her back end office, dropped her mutual fund license, and became a Private Wealth Advisor associated with Raintree.

She’s found that she trusts the diligence Raintree puts into selecting quality private investments. And importantly, they have referral arrangements with portfolio managers, so she can still offer great managed portfolios to her clients.

“It was kind of the best of both worlds,” she says.

The debate over fees and compensation can be a heated one, with one common argument for fee-for-service arrangements being that clients don’t like it when their advisor works on commission. There’s this idea that you’ll always work in the best interest of whoever is paying you. If the client’s not paying you, it’s hard to ensure you’re always in it for them.

That’s why Janea decided to offer her clients a choice: they could either pay her an hourly rate for financial planning, or she could earn a commission from any insurance or investment products she helped them implement as part of the plan.

So far, not a single client has ever chosen to pay the hourly rate.

The reason is that they trust the plan she has created — which she completes before officially engaging the client. They see value in what she has done for them and how her suggestions will benefit them, so they don’t have any issues with her earning her living through commissions.

The key here is that Janea is transparent about the possible methods of compensation and what they mean, and she gives her clients the option of choosing what they’re most comfortable with.

One challenging piece of Janea’s business has been educating her clients about alternative assets and “the fact that investments don’t just end with stocks, mutual funds, bonds, and GICs. There’s a whole other world out there of investments.”

She’s certainly careful about informing clients of the risks associated with private investments, but she also wants them to know the potential benefits.

For instance, she shares that she works with private investment companies that have good track records, large employee bases, and good board management.

Janea’s been working with one couple for the last three years and spent a lot of time telling them about what private investments can bring to their portfolio and how she ensures those investments are diverse.

For a long time, they were very wary of the risks. However, they did eventually implement some private equity.

Then 2018 came along. It, of course, wasn’t a great year for the public market. In the meantime, the couple’s private equity investments went up, and their portfolio as a whole remained stable.

Now, Janea has to reign them in the other way — now that they’ve seen the benefits of alternative investments, she’s advising them to maintain a balanced portfolio and not err in the other direction.

Hint: Even if you don’t offer private investments to your clients, you’ve probably had to help mitigate the effects of both fear and excitement on investor behaviour and portfolio stability. For more advice on managing investor behaviour, listen back to our episode with Steadyhand’s Tom Bradley.

To learn more from Janea, make sure you catch the full episode where she discusses the importance of cash flow management, her tips for marketing yourself in a smaller city, and why she recommends that new advisors build their book of business organically.

In the episode, Janea also mentions a cash-flow specialist course that helped her completely change the way she addresses cash-flow with her clients.  We’ve partnered with CacheFlo, the company that created this course, to run a free webinar: Finding the Money to Fund Financial Planning. To learn about why traditional budgeting doesn’t work, why cash-flow is about so much more than just math, and how to unlock its value for clients, register for the webinar — we’ll see you on the inside!