Here’s How To Determine If You Should Keep Or Break Up With Your Advisor

You're wondering if it actually makes sense to logistically how it works , and this is what I'm going to help you understand , because sometimes it's you actually haven't asked them the right questions and they're a great advisor . Sometimes it's no . I know I should be moving on , but I just don't know how to approach that . They're a family friend .

I've been with them for years . 80% of people that are reaching out to us they have an advisor , but there's something missing .

They're not doing the tax planning , they don't specifically work with people retiring early , they don't understand the nuance involved with withdrawal rates or healthcare , and so they're coming to us going listen , if I could pay less and get way more . This is a no brainer , but sometimes it's not that simple .

Sometimes it's what we call an incremental brainer hey , they're pretty good , they're doing all this stuff right , but yeah , they're just not doing the tax piece and sometimes that's worth it . Sometimes it's not worth it . And so today is not me saying go fire your advisor . Today is me going here's how to think through it .

Here's some myths that you might be thinking . We call it head trash right now , so that if you do decide that you want to break up with your advisor , here's actually how it works . So some of you are going , hey , I don't even have an advisor .

Well , this might not apply to you , but it's still going to be helpful for you to understand that when that day comes , if you do hire an advisor , how to know if you should keep them or if you should move on . So the really important thing that I want all of you to know is my parents were burned by four financial advisors .

That is why I became an advisor . Now , a lot of you already know that , but the important thing of why I mentioned that is it's not like these other advisors were stealing their money or doing a terrible thing . They weren't doing anything crazy like that .

And so some people hear me say the word burned and they're like , oh my God , did they like lose everything ? No , when I say burned , what I mean is they were not optimized .

Now you're like , hey , all right , burned is kind of an extreme word there , and I probably could choose a different word that might be more applicable , but it's the word that resonates with me , because right now they're working .

Luckily , they like what they do , but in large part , they wouldn't be working if they were doing the right things , if their fees were lower and if they were a whole lot more intentional with the way they invested and saved on taxes .

So I'm lucky that they like what they do , but my point is they're working right now because they have to , not because they want to , and a good advisor should show you how to do the opposite , in that you should be paying them gladly going . Yep , there is tremendous value here .

Now a lot of you are gonna be like listen , how do I even approach this conversation of breaking up with my advisor ? And I like to start with don't Like first , before you break up with an advisor , even consider it like have another option in place so that you're like oh , I know where I'm gonna go .

Don't just break up for the sake of it and most of you won't , and that's a good thing , and that's a good thing , but it's also I'll joke that I am the meanest early retirement advisor because I don't want you to retire too early and run the risk of running out .

I also don't want you to break up with an advisor and then be like , okay , well , now I need guidance , where do I go ? It's almost like quitting a job and then being like , okay , what am I going to do now ? So my point here is logistically , this is a big hurdle for people . There's nothing your advisor can do .

It's not like they have the assets locked . Even if , for example , my parents were at Wells Fargo and they wanted to switch at one point to UBS and they were like , listen , I think I can move my money , but I don't know how do I approach that . And then we found this was years ago . Obviously , there's no lock .

They can transfer their money whenever they want . There's no lock . They can transfer their money whenever they want . Right now , if you're at UBS or Merrill Lynch or you know wherever you Vanguard Fidelity , you can move your money to wherever you want . There's no lock that an advisor has .

Now what you don't want to do is move your money and then your advisor's like , hey , what's going on here ? I thought we had a good thing going . You know , we were talking about Netflix last week and now you're firing me . So you don't want any awkward conversation Now let's talk about , because logistically , that's just a big hurdle , fyi .

There is nothing they can do to stop money moving now . Okay , great , logistically . But now how do I know if I should break up with my advisor ? Like , give me the hard details .

And a lot of you know this , I do my kind of dopey stories , but when I went to the doctor a few months ago this was many months ago now I said , hey , doc , that sounded great . I think you think that sounded great . I don't know what you just said , and so give it to me in English . And too often I hear people say , yeah , it depends .

It's like , yes , it does depend , but still give me guidance . So that's what I'm going to do for you right now . So if your advisor has never asked for your tax return , that's what I call a pink flag . There's red flags , pink flags and , of course , green flags .

Now if your advisors never asked for your tax return , it's , by the way , probably not their fault , meaning it's very rare , I see it's actually the advisor's fault .

Whenever someone comes to me , more often than not it's the firm not letting that advisor do what they actually want to do , and the reason I know that is because a lot of the advisors that work for me . Now they are coming from Fidelity and Goldman Sachs and Vanguard going . Listen , they make me work with 400 , 300 people .

I can't possibly do tax planning and withdrawal analysis and healthcare , and all of this for everyone , or else I won't even see my family . So my point here is your advisor might actually be great , but their firm doesn't let them do their best work . So FYI there . Now to my main point here .

If your advisor is not asking you for your tax return , I do not know how they could offer tax planning . So here's what they might say . They might say go talk to your CPA . And your CPA they're going to say go talk to your advisor . So now here you are playing middleman , and here's why this occurs . Your advisor wants to be careful .

Maybe at the firm they're at , they don't do tax planning or it's not their expertise . So they're going to say go talk to your CPA . Now your CPA's job is as follows . Their job let's assume I'm their client . They go Ari , look how much I saved you this year , or tried to save you in taxes . Would you please come pay me again next year ?

Not a bad job , that's an important job . They are preparing your return . That is not what we do . What I just explained is a tax preparer . We do what's called tax planning . So what you are likely hoping for right now is that your advisor is going to say , hey , go talk to your CPA .

And your CPA is going to come back to you with hey , here's why tax brackets are changing and how you might be able to retire earlier if you implement this strategy and the importance of harvesting . But wait a second , those required distributions are going to hit . You probably want all of that guidance . Your tax preparer is not going to give that to you .

So this is me saying they're not bad and don't beat them up . That's not what they do . That's what I think a financial advisor should do . But your advisor might not be allowed to because their firm doesn't offer tax planning A lot of these older firms . They just aren't up with the times and say , yep , go talk to your CPA .

And it's almost easier for a compliance thing to say , yeah , we don't do taxes . If you don't do taxes , I don't know how you do planning . And that's the reality , because any investment decision is actually a tax decision . Because if we're going to select an investment and there's dividends , well , how are the dividends taxed ? Is it qualified ? Is it non-qualified ?

How much interest is coming in ? How does all of this connect to what I want most in life ? So tax planning is huge . If your advisor right now says , hey , go talk to your CPA and your CPA says , yeah , no , your advisor should be doing that , that's one reason to potentially consider firing and having a new advisor . Now , that's number one .

Number two if your advisor right now is in similar age to you , what's going to happen when they retire ? And are you playing interviewer the next 5 , 10 , 15 ? Who's Lewis ?

Where , all of a sudden , you like your advisor , it's going well , you've got a good relationship going , you're talking about Netflix and then all of a sudden you're like , wait a second , I'm in zoom and this Lewis guys here , who's Lewis and we call it the who's Lewis because all of a sudden you like your advisor and you're passed off to the next advisor .

Now , that happened to my parents a and it's not a terrible thing and you can't ever promise no one's going to guarantee to work with you forever . You don't know if someone's going to quit or do something else .

But in our world , my hope is that you have that advisor for 20 , 30-plus years and there's a reason that no advisor has ever left Root Financial , where we work . Because , look , we recognize when people are coming . They don't want to have to work with 300 people , they don't want a quota .

I they don't want to have to work with 300 people , they don't want a quota . I don't even get to decide if you get to work with Root fully . My job is to take the first call with everyone to even see if you want what we're looking for .

And then you get to talk to one of our advisors and our advisor is like yeah , you're awesome , I want to work with you , or no , you know what I can just tell , based on what , I'm not going to be able to meet your expectation . So I want to tell you right now or , yeah , I can meet it , but I'm not going to be taking on new clients .

If you reach back out in eight months , there's another advisor here , but it won't be me . So I want to give my advisors total control . I'm asking them to do proactive planning . Most firms are like no , no , no , what are we doing ? More revenue ?

Just have four or 500 clients , because I'm going to make way more money , and that's an approach that does not resonate with us . So the important thing here where is your advisor , both in age and in goals ? And the question to ask him is hey , what's your succession plan ? Like , god forbid , you get hit by a bus . My dopey joke here .

Someone said hey , if you get hit by a double decker like you know , because I manage clients' money they go hey , do you get hit by a double-decker bus , what's gonna happen ? I go does it have to be a double-decker ? Could it be like a Mini Cooper or something Like okay , anyway .

So my point here I said , well , you have three options and you guys have these three options too . Let's assume , hypothetically , you're working with your advisor right now . You could , if God forbid , something happened to them . Um , but it's just , it was , they were great . I don't really trust anyone else , but I'm going to keep my money there .

That's one option . You can say you know what ? They were great , but I still need help here . So , like they were so good , I kind of had a relationship with their assistant and maybe they're going to become an advisor one day . So I'm willing to kind of give them a chance .

Or you could say this totally sucks , I'm going to move all my money to vanguard or fidelity , so schwab , wherever you want . So you , almost you have three options . This is the important thing . So number one are they reviewing your taxes ? Are they doing tax planning ?

Number two and this is the big one in my opinion is hey , are you having another job in retirement where you're interviewing every five , 10 years and potentially subjecting yourself to the who's Lewis ? And then number three . Number three is a four part thing . You're like , oh my God , there's a lot here . It is okay .

So I'm gonna tell you this is the four hoops . I tell everyone this is what I say on the first call .

So if you are right now , if you've booked a call with me I know right now the availability isn't for three , four months , but if you've booked a call with me or a member of my team and you might be listening to this , it's not applicable to you anymore .

But the point here is there's four hoops , okay , so I'm going to give you the four hoops and these are going to help you understand right now . Okay , is this my advisor ? Should I break up ? Should I move on ?

And then I'm going to tell you the hardest part right after this , which is , even if all of these things resonate , and you go yeah , I know I should , you're still not going to want to because you're a good human . And the truth is I don't work with robots , I work with people , and people have emotions . And you're like listen , I get on paper .

I could possibly pay less and get way more , and I know I probably should . But there's a reason you probably don't work out every day of the week , even though you should , and there's a reason that you still want dessert , because you're a human and you're allowed to have those wants and desires .

It's about being able to go okay , what do I care about most for the rest of my life and how do I think through that ? So I'm gonna give you a few examples in a second , but here are the four hoops . Okay , so number one someone reached out and they said hey , I heard you're a fiduciary . Like , when do I start ?

And I said I don't really like the word fiduciary . They go wait , are you guys not fiduciaries ? No , we are 110% of percent of the time . We must legally act in your best interest . It's crazy that not every advisor does that , but that's the reality . They go oh , okay , good . So like when do I start ?

I said I told you I didn't really like that word , why not ? Well , my parents were working with Fidelity at one point and Fidelity is great . I like Fidelity products . But if your advisor is working at Fidelity and recommending Fidelity , there's a conflict of interest there and someone's like wait , but they're a fiduciary , that's right .

They could be a fiduciary and still only want to incentivize their own products and that advisor isn't once again doing a bad job . They're trying to do what they think is best and they've got a family to feed and so there's a reason they're going to push a certain product . Some people are like whoa , whoa , whoa , you hate fidelity . No , I don't , okay .

Oh , you hate Fidelity . No , I don't , okay , I don't hate anyone . I hate the fact that you are not optimizing right now . That is true , but I do not hate Fidelity or Vanguard or Schwab . In fact , I like them . So that's number one . Number two someone else said hey , I heard you're a certified financial planner . Like when do I start ?

And I said how many doctors have you met that are MDs that you wouldn't let touch your body ? And they're like what do you mean ? And I go well , just because someone's certified , I'm certified , I'm a certified financial planner , I have an MBA in financial .

Don't hire me just because I have letters after my name , kind of like the doctor example I told you before . It's like listen , I care that you have the credentials so that we can even have a conversation , but then from there it's got to go deeper .

So my point here is if you're a fiduciary and you're a CFP and you're considering to hire an advisor , number one , if your advisor are not those things , that's a red flag . Now , if they are both of those things , great , you can still talk to them . It doesn't mean go fire them and it doesn't mean that they're amazing . It means neither of those things .

From there , the next step is okay , do you do holistic planning for people like me ? Because some people are like I'm gonna work with everyone . You're 20 , you're 60 , yep , bring it on . Other people like ourselves are going listen , we work with people at a certain stage of life . They've done a really good job . They're in their 40s or 50s and 60s .

They go even 60s , of course , beyond , for the rest of your life . Like , listen , I wanna optimize . I didn't necessarily feel like I needed an advisor up until this point because I'm just saving my 401k and you know , doing the right things . But now here I am considering our retirement the next few years I don't know what to do .

I've got Roth conversions and tax gain harvesting and my advisor is not modeling that stuff out and they tell me to go talk to a CPA . And so here I am kind of playing middleman , but I know I need help . I get that there's value , just don't know how to actually go about getting that and I don't really know if I want to break up with my advisor .

So that's not me saying go do it , even if we do all of that tax stuff , which we do . But it's about you going okay , how important is that to me and do I recognize the importance of that and do you want that ? Like some people are , like I don't want to optimize . I like the fact that I have an advisor .

They talk to me once a year , it's not a big headache . I'm like great , like don't work with us because with us it's way more work , and so I joke that my job's to kind of half scare people away from what we do , because it's for those that are eager and want this optimization level of planning .

Now I think most people deep down do want it , but they're like listen , how much work is this ? Well , the first one to two months , it's like four or five , six , seven , really as many meetings as it takes for you to understand the plan . So number three is deep , holistic planning designed for people like you . Is that what they specialize in ?

And the number four is it goes beyond software . Like , what do you mean ? I'll give you my dopey story . It's not dopey , there's a real one . Actually , I've got some dopey ones , as you guys know . But so this client comes to me . They go um , not a client , excuse me , new potential client . And they go not a client , excuse me , new potential client .

And they go hey , I think I'm in a good spot to retire . I've got like 2.1 million bucks and I don't want to spend like crazy . And here's what I want to do , and I'm gonna have an inheritance and all this stuff . And so I said , okay , like when do you want to start ? Here's our approach , all that good stuff .

And they go no , no , I just want to tell you real quick , like kind of what's going down , and like I've got this Monte Carlo . So like , are you do agree or disagree that I can retire . I go , oh , monte Carlo , and they go yeah , I go , okay , let's talk about that . And I kind of do it to humor myself . I do six of these calls a day .

So I'll say what is your Monte Carlo say ? And they'll say Well , you know , I kind of ran through the simulations . It does like 10,000 or something . It's pretty cool . And it says I have a 99% chance of success . And I said that's so cool . Oh , my God , that's so great . It's almost a hundred . You should like go retire .

They're like , yeah , but I don't know I go . What don't you know ? They go . Something's irking me . It's just I can't put a word on it , but I just don't know . I think I know and it looks good on the plan , but I don not sure I go . Does it assume that brackets change and that you implement conversions ? They go , oh , no , I go .

What's the plan for healthcare ? Are you going to take advantage of subsidies and keep your income low and are you going to use the guardrails approach to withdraw income ? They go no , no , I don't know that stuff . It just it says 99 . And I said I'm going to tell you . And I told this to them .

I said I'm going to tell you something you're not going to like to hear , but I'm not here to be your best friend , I'm here to give you transparent guidance . And once again , I'm the meanest advisor . And they go okay , give it to me , I go . You have a fake 99 . Like what do you mean ?

I go , you have a 99 that looks good , it feels good , and so you almost have a plan like self-diagnosing . If so , I'm a soccer player and I'll try to relate to my clients and friends as best I can when I'm talking about money . I'll go hey , if you think you're in a good spot , that's like you .

Like , you know , pulling your hamstring going listen , I don't think it's that bad , you know , maybe it's a week , I know the degree of it and you need an MRI . And an MRI is a really in-depth , quality financial plan , not just a Monte Carlo . Monte Carlo is like okay , I think I hurt my hamstring .

I think I'm good if I just do physical therapy , but I don't know , and what if , all of a sudden , I come back too soon and hurt my hamstring again ? Not a perfect analogy , but I do my best , and so my point here is I want my clients to understand . What if you live way longer than you think ? What if healthcare costs go up ? What if taxes go up ?

What if , all of a sudden , you're like , oh my God , I want to spend way more than I initially figured ? What if you get unlucky and markets just don't perform well like they have recently ? If all of those things happen and you're still in a good spot , okay , great . Now we're talking about retirement . But too often people retire and go .

Yeah , I kind of hope I'm going to work out . So if you're like , hey , I don't have that level of confidence in my plan Another reason to consider hiring an advisor . And then , lastly , I am the weird advisor that likes talking about fees . And that is the thing that most advisors are like hey , listen , you're fine .

And like you know , you look , your money's going up . So , like , if you didn't work with us and you didn't fire your advisor , you'd also still probably be okay . Okay , now I'll say that a lot on my videos and other advisors hear me say it . You're like , hey , would you like kind of pipe down on saying that You're kind of hurting my business ?

I'm like , I don't care , that's not my problem . My job is to make sure that I'm justifying value through some multiple of the fee we're charging . So here's my point when you're working with an advisor , when it comes to fees , and the way to think about this is it's got to be transparent . You got to know what you're paying right now .

And I'm going to give you an example of this . So client comes to me and they have $4.4 million . Okay , I'm gonna do the math with you . I've got my phone right here . I'm not pre-record this , I'm just telling you . I'm doing it right now with you . So client comes to me , they have $4.4 million and they go . And I said how much are they charging you ?

And they're like I don't know . I go okay , let's take a safe assumption . Do they ever talk to you about if you have more money ? They charge less or they go ? No , it's just 1% . I go okay , 1% of $4.4 million , that's $44,000 . So I said , if you're working with us , here's what the fee would be .

I'm going to do it with you guys right now so you can understand it , because it's very difficult in our world . And if you tried looking on your statement , by the way . One , it might not be there . Two , they're going to give you prospectuses for all the mutual funds and ETFs and things that you own .

If you want to fall asleep , do me a favor and try reading one of those . I nerd out over this stuff . Okay , I like it a little bit . I'd like to more than I admit , but the truth is even I'm not reading those things , okay . So here's my point . I'm going to do it with you .

We have a tiered structure , so this and this is how a lot of advisors work , so it's not me promoting us . I don't care if you work with us or don't work with us . I care that you don't pay more than you need to and you get holistic guidance . And I think we're good at10,000 . Okay , so , 1% . You're like okay , got it .

The next 2 million , between one to 3 million , that is not billed at 1% . Let's keep it really simple . Let's assume it was 1% on 4.4 . Once again , 1.1% , for that's 44,000 . So let's add up what our fee would be , just because this is how a lot of other firms work . So , okay , 1% of a million , that's 10,000 . I got that .

The next 2 million is billed at 0.75% . You're like well , that's not 1% . I go , that's true , it changes . The fee decreases as the assets increase . You're like okay . So let me kind of understand this a little more clearly . So I'm going to give you the example . So I know I just said so twice . I was just changing something on my computer real quick .

I want to make sure that this is tracking . I'm like I do a lot of my in-house recording on my own . So here's my point 2 million , 0.75% , 2 million more dollars , that's $15,000 . That's $7,500 each . Okay , so $15,000 . Okay , $3 million is 25,000 versus $3 million . Not with any of this tiered business , but just 1% would be 30,000 .

Okay , great , let's continue on . So now we've got 1% on the first million at 10,000 . The next 2 million so between 1 million and 3 million is about 0.75% , that's 15,000 . We're at 25,000 . What about the next 1.4 million to bring us all the way up once again to 4.4 million ? Well , we're going to take half a percent of that , that's an additional $7,000 .

Like where are you at ? Are you like 12 million ? No , so now we're at 10,000 plus the 15 . That's 25 plus 7,000 . Plus 7,000 . So now , $32,000 a year would be the cost to work with us on a $4.4 million portfolio , versus the 44,000 they're paying . They're like oh my God , 32,000 a year . Is this like real numbers ?

I go yeah , and our clients are begging to pay us 60 or 80 or a hundred because we're adding value in X of that by some multiple , or else do not hire us . And , by the way , that's not even the main reason . People are hiring us . They're hiring us to fully delegate all this stuff . But here's my point .

This couple was said and they're very reasonable and I hear this a lot . I talked to a lot of nice people . They go listen , I get it . I know I could cut my costs from 44 to 32 . And after you explain that I get it , but I just it's and I know there's value . I'm not kind of saying there's not , it's just hard for me to do .

I have a relationship here . Some of you are listening to this , going , oh my God , I could fire someone tomorrow if you told me that I'd save more . I'd get way more . So this is not gonna apply to all of you , but some of you are like , no , this is me . Yep , it's gonna be difficult to do .

So my point here when it less the question is do they add more value ? Now , in this example , they go yeah , and I said , no , you're not paying $44,000 a year . They go , yeah , I am . You told me 1% on $4.4 million . I go no , you're spending $80,000 a year . They go what ? I go ?

Yeah , because there's all these expenses of all the investments you own , all of those mutual funds and ETFs . They have really high fees because your advisor is being incentivized to pick one over another , because their commission is higher . They're like what would your commission be ? I'm like we don't have commissions . They go .

So then , like what do we just have nothing ? I go , no , we have something . We just we don't care what we use because we don't get paid by them . So my incentive is to keep them really low . Because of this fun example I'm going to tell you right now . So , right now . So they go .

Whoa , $80,000 a year is what I'm paying right now , and with you guys it's , you know , 32,000 . That's a big difference . I go it's not 32 because there's still investment fees , but I'd want that to probably be in the range of two to 3000 . You don't want the lowest . I'm going to give you an example why .

So you're probably paying 80 right now and I'd want you to pay 35 . They're like hey know , that's north of $40,000 , $45,000 in savings and that can be quantified . So a lot of this can and a lot of it can't . So here's my favorite story with investments and I just want to tell it to you , because your advisor may have explained this to you .

They may not have , but it's a good question to ask them . And then I'm going to kind of finalize my thoughts here and make your life easy . So , right off the bat , here's what I need you to know . I try to keep it fun in the meeting . So I go to my client . I say , hey , what grocery store do you go to ?

And they're like right now I go to like Fred Meyer , and they live in Washington . Some of you are like I've never heard of Fred Meyer , I just learned about . Not just learned , but a few months ago I started doing these calls . I'm learning about Publix . So a lot of you are like , yeah , I kind of say there's three buckets .

There's the dollar store , then there's Trader Joe's , albertsons , vons , then there's Whole Foods and Erewhon . If you know Erewhon in LA , you're like , oh my God , this is like the most expensive store ever . And it is . So here's my point Active management , those really high fees and expenses . That's like going to Erewhon or Whole Foods and buying paper plates .

You don't need to do that , okay , you're unnecessarily paying where you don't get BB paying for your buck , okay . Now other people are like , oh so I should keep my cost as low as humanly possible . I go , no , you probably don't wanna do that . That's kind of like going to the dollar store for everything . You're like , oh , what's wrong with the dollar store ?

I go , nothing's wrong with the dollar store . You could go there and buy your groceries and you're still going to eat . But is it the best value ? Is the quality of the food the best ? Probably not . Now , if you're like working at dollar store and you're offended right now , that's not why I'm doing this . No-transcript joe's . That's not my point here .

My point is you want to make sure you are paying in aligning with the approach that resonates with you . A lot of my clients go . You know , I kind of like the idea of the dollar store , but just for like the paper plates .

And you know , stuff like napkins , like I don't need Whole Foods napkins or Trader Joe's napkins , but then for Trader Joe's or for my investments that you know having create income for me , I don't want to pay more than I need to .

But I want to make sure I don't just have dollar store stuff Like I need bank for my buck here , I need value , and that's my job is to come to you and go hey , what if we use Vanguard , or what if we use Schwab , or what if we use Fidelity or Empower ? Here's all the benefits and pros and cons and you'll be able to go . I like this approach .

That resonates with me . Oh , I kind of like the blend approach here . No , this one really makes a lot of sense to me . So you're still making the final call , but your advisor , you should right now be putting your hand up going . I know which approach I have .

And if you're like I don't know another potential reason to break up with your advisor , so logistically for clients that want to work with us , I'm sending them language , because it's very difficult to even break up with your advisor and I say don't break up with your advisor today . So the way it works here you have a conversation with me .

If I think you're a potential good fit , great , and you potentially think you want to work with us , now you don't get to work with us . You talk to one of our advisors and our advisors is like oh my gosh , yeah , this is a perfect match for heaven . We're going to love each other Only after that .

Well , now you'd break up with your advisor and begin working with us , so you can have a conversation with me without breaking up with your advisor or someone on my team . Then , after you speak with your advisor , we send you what's called advisor transition language . You don't need this , but it can be helpful .

So if you're wondering , should I break with my advisor , should I not ? This is going to help you have that conversation . Now . Some people send an email , some people do a phone call , whatever resonates with you .

The important thing I want to mention here there's one quote that comes from Naval Ravikant that a lot of you know , and he says and I like this there's a famous example . If you ask everyone hey , how would you rate your driving average below average , above average , amazing , horrible .

Like 80% of people say above average , which is impossible , of course , statistically . So then he kind of brings up this other example of and I'm just reading it , there's this quote here he goes hey , if 50-50 , if you're 50-50 on a decision , you're overweighting comfort . And that's the reality .

Is , if you're like hey , I don't know , I'm kind of should I or should I not ? You're just overweighting the fact that you have something you already know and there's this scary unknown . And I'm not here to say it's not scary , I'm here to say is it worth it ? And that's what hopefully educating can do . So just want to tell you that quick thing there .

That is what I wanted to go through . I'm checking my last things on my agenda Other than that . Oh , a few quick things . This is just kind of nuance . If you are considering breaking up with your advisor , are there any proprietary funds ? So it's very rare I see this , but Fidelity has a few proprietary funds , which is like they cannot transfer .

Like if you were to move them anywhere , you'd have to sell stuff and it's a whole thing . Cannot transfer Like if you were to move them anywhere there , you'd have to sell stuff and it's a whole thing . So that's kind of number one and then number two um , any life insurance or annuities or stuff like that , that can be complicated .

Don't fret over it right now . It's going to be okay . But my point here is don't essentially be like I'm not going to break up with them because of that , but don't just start transferring stuff , like there could be tax implications . And then , really , the biggest thing is the question we invite you to ask yourself is what division ?

What decision would future you make ? What decision would future you make If you're like you know what , I think I should do this and my future self would like me to do it ? Okay , maybe consider breaking up with your advisor If you're like no turns out , they're great and they're awesome , and I just need to ask them all these questions .

Great , like , maybe it doesn't make sense too . So I'm not here to break up for the sake of breaking up . I'm here to make sure you're optimizing . So one of my longer podcast episodes , but an important one , and hope that you guys find it valuable . Thank you for listening to another episode of the early retirement show .

If you have a question that you want answered in a future episode , you can always go to my website , earlyretirementpodcastcom . That's earlyretirementpodcastcom , and you can go ahead and submit a question that I'll look to answer in a future episode . Thank you all for listening .

Please do rate it , review it and share it with someone who you think would benefit from this information . If there's anyone out there that you know , I certainly appreciate it and I will see you all each week . Hey guys , it's me again . Please be smart about this . Nothing in this podcast should be construed as financial , tax or legal advice .

Consult with your tax preparer or financial advisor before taking any action . This podcast is for informational purposes only .