Financial Advisors Aren't All Bad #206

Right Well now, I wouldn't even say that most of them aren't bad, but it's just kind of funny because we've talked about this before and often we talk about how we necessarily a lot of times don't need financial advisors, right for for a lot of folks, it may not be necessary, but there are some instances when having a financial advisor in your corner where that's important, and so because of that, it's important to know what those instances are, as well as some of the different things that you

need to keep an eye out for when you are looking at financial advisors. So that's why we're talking about this today. And the role of financial advice has expanded, the services are offering have grown, and I think it's important to talk about the nature of what a financial advisor is, what they can do for you, and whether or not you should even be considering one. And so, yeah, man, I think we've got a lot to share on this one today. Yeah, man, But first I've got a frugal

or cheap for you, we're bringing it back Kate. My wife. My wife, she was wanting her hair done. I guess it's been a couple of months now at this point, but she was wanting color and cut and dude, in Atlanta, you get something like that going on, and it's going to cost you a lot of money, like like overs get your hair done and not cheap. Yeah, definitely not cheap, especially living in the city, right, And she was specifically wanting this this thing done called I don't exactly not

how to pronounced. I think it's ballyage or ballyage something like that. Sounds like something fancy that would be expensive. It's it's a French technique. Evidently she was telling me about it, but she was wanting that specifically, which is a little bit more expensive. And so she was kind of stuck with the conundrum of like, is this something I are we gonna d I why this? Or do I go in and pay top dollar to have it done. And the reason we're talking about it is obviously because

she took the risk. You know, she was risking being cheap in order to be frugal and save a few bucks. That's because she made you do it for her, right, she made me do it. But she pulled up some great tutorials online. I think she spent a lot of time, yeah, finding the right one. Maybe maybe too much time, but she found the best tutorial for me to watch, and she bought like the really good chemicals, Like you can buy the actual chemicals, the actual bleach and toner, all

that kind of stuff that the salons used. And it costs way more, but when you're looking at you know, more than ten times that to have this done in a salon, it's well worth it to get the real stuff, right, to get the good stuff. So yeah, man, we did that. I watched it tutorial and I was like, are you sure you want to go through with this? Because here's the thing, Like, I've never done this before. Aught your

marriage to a new level. We did. We seriously, Like I've cut her hair before, you know, I cut my We we've talked about this before, one of the things we do, Like I've I've cut my own hair since I think like middle school, but I have never done anything with chemicals before. I was super insure about that kind of freaked me up, but Kate was down with it. She's like, watch this. She's like, I trust you. And we went for it, dude, and the results results were in.

It turned out pretty good. She was happy with it, especially considering that it was the first time we'd ever done it, you know, and so we did it and I was you know, I asked her after the fact. I was like, is this something we're gonna do in the future, And she was like totally. She was on board with it. She was happy with the results. We're not going to post a picture of it. I didn't

take anything. It was it was a while ago. But but yeah, man, is that I feel like this is a good example of, you know, one of these areas in our life where we can save some money. But make sure you do the research, make sure you have the proper tools on hand. Like I went out to the Sally beauty salon and make sure I had like the right gloves and everything, because I don't want like that bleaching my fingers, So I had those black gloves

that they use in the beauty salon. I like, legit. Well, now that the word of your skills is getting out, you're gonna have people right and left lining up to have their hair done by you. Yeah, I don't think it's not that good, but I think over time it really will get to that level. I feel like we were able to get Kate's hair like of the way there. We were lacking ten per and like the quality, but seriously, like beyond that, I feel like the next time we

might get it up to like the way there. And it did take some time though, so like it took about maybe an hour of my time, but it was on the weekend. We're just kind of hanging out, hanging out with the kids, cleaning the house some and the girls were wanting to watch a movie and they wanted to watch Lion King. Uh, like the real version, you know, not the cartoon version. Have you seen the new like the real version I have. Yeah, it was good. It's

freaking amazing. Dude. We've watched to play too many Disney movies now Disney Plus. That's why like's like we've we've got Disney Plus now we're watching all the good movies. But so we had that on we knocked it out of the park man nice man. Well, yeah, I love that decision to to give it a go at least, and it reminds me of doing your own pest control Matt we which we talked about a long time ago. It's been a long time, but it saves you so much money and you can buy the exact same stuff

that the pros use. There's an article about that on our website at how the Money dot com. But it's one of those things that people might be like, oh no, there must be some sort of proprietary data that I don't have, But now really know, the Internet exists and the data is there for all of us to look at. When it comes to you know, doing whatever this Bai baile age or whatever. I think it's bollyash, you know,

it's worth mentioning to that. Maybe I kind of have the artist touch a little bit, like I was able to get it to that level, I would probably have bungled it completely. Are you gonna do Emilies here? Now? I'm gonna let you do her hair now? I don't have time for that, Okay, all right, although Kate has cut her cut Emily's hair before, that's right, right for sure? Yeah, And it's saved us a good bit of money. So obviously, professional stylists exists for a reason, just like professional pest

control companies exist for a reason. But I think for most of us, if we're willing to accept inferior results, we can save a whole lot of money. Yeah. And the degree of inferiorness depends per person, right, yeah, exactly. That might be very inferior or it might be pretty good. So it's up to you and what you think you can tackle, no doubt. All right, Matt, let's mention the

beer that we're having on the show today. We're in Catharsis by Treehouse Brewing Company and Brian and Caitlin listeners from Massachusetts and this one our way much thanks, because Treehouse is a brewery that has lines out the door for their beer seriously super high demand. So I'm really excited to try this porter from Treehouse today on the show with you today, my friend. Yeah, they these are

one of these breweries that's like a beacon. All these other small berries have been popping up the past few years. You know, they're they're looking to the Treehouse that's sort of like this beacon as as like this lighthouse as they're navigating the foggy waters of of how to run a brewery. Man, you're so good at analogies. That's good to think. I feel inspired by this beer Treehouse Lighthouse. I can see how you made that. Is that what I was thinking? I think, so get out of my head. Yeah,

but always excited to have a treehouse beer. It's very rare and always a pleasure. And we'll talk about our thoughts on this one at the end of the episode. All right, onto the subject at hand. We're talking about financial advisers and how they're not all bad. There are professionals who can help us in almost every aspect of our lives. Right, in some cases we can go it alone, Matt, I think you and I we we tend towards going it alone, as we just talked about, right, we we

like I like the d I Y approach saves this money. Yeah, we don't mind experimenting a little bit here and there to see if we can save more money. Specifically on our wives. Yeah, we like to use them as test subjects. In some cases it's a slam dunk, easy decision. However, I'm not gonna watch a YouTube video on how to perform surgery through my kids tonsils. Right, that's like probably a little a little too far fetch for me to undertake, just barely, just one step too far and one step

too far. Of course, I'm gonna let a doctor handle that. On the other hand, if my water bills shot up and I think my toilet is leaking water, well, it's really easy to go and buy a new toilet flapper valve and install it. There's no need to call a plumber for this basic thing that can go wrong. And so, yeah, where do financial advisors fit into that picture of d I Y versus hiring the expert. We're gonna cover that today. Yeah, man, that's the biggest problem, right, like knowing when to to

call in the pros or when to do it yourself. Like, there are a lot of aspects of our personal finances that don't require professional help. You don't need a financial advisor. You don't need a professional to tell you that you need to start paying down your debts and to go ahead and make sure that you get that employer match in your four O one K. That's that slam Dunkey's decision, right, Like,

that's something that you can do yourself. But there are some more complicated issues that might arise when it would make sense to hire pro and and like you said, all that's what we're going to dive into today. Yeah, first man, I think we kind of need to discuss what a financial advisor does because knowing what they do can help us decide what direction we need to go in. And and first off, the term financial advisors kind of this catch all term. A lot of people call themselves

a financial advisor. And also the credentials and services that a financial advisor performs for a client. They vary from firm to firm and from advisor to advisor. And at the same time, the job of a financial advisor has changed in recent years. The industry is evolving in what individuals require when it comes to money help and advice is different than it was twenty years ago, and advisors

are responding accordingly. In particular, younger advisors are are tending to meet these market demands for a comprehensive service as opposed to just investing advice. Some of these advisors are

even offering beer advice, like beer recommendations. Those guys, come on, go ahead, and for the record, it's going to go out there in state that we are not financial advisors, Like this is something you and I enjoy, we have a passion for it, but yeah, we are not you know, professional financial advisors, So we don't really have skin in

this game at all. Yeah, although, like I said, almost anybody can call themselves financial advisors is to catch all term and so we could say that we were, but we don't have any technical training exactly that has led us to to be able to call ourselves that. So and so for c OA reasons, I like to just stay away from that completely. Yeah, completely. And advisor is typically they used to specialize in discussing like those long term goals. Like right, I'm thinking of like the old

kind of traditional advisors. You know, you kind of go into the office, you sit down at their desk, and they they're like, let's talk about your money, like old giant oak desk. Yeah, that kind of approach. But you know that's where they would manage your investments and also help you to think through some different life insurance necessities. But now, like you said, you like they offer such

a wide gamut of services. They can offer budgeting help, they can help create some debt payoff plans, offer college admissions advice, someone even proof read resumes. As individual investor has gotten easier in the costs have plummeted, advisors are offering more services to justify the value, to justify the fee that they charge, and the value is tied up more in the advice about tricky money decisions, and it's not just about trying to beat the stock market average.

So is a financial advisor worth it? That's really the question that a lot of people have on their minds, and we're gonna get into some specifics to help people figure that out. But but part of what makes this decision to hire a financial advisor or not so difficult is that it's hard to measure the value that they can potentially bring to you with these services that they offer. How do you quantify budget help and college admissions advice over what you can do on your own without any help.

So to answer to that question, some researchers at morning Star did a study that measured the value that financial advisors can provide, and Matt I think there were like kind of three studies that did something similarly. Vanguard did another one, and basically, these studies have found that a good planner can increase retirement income well over making even a one percent annual fee well worth the cost. But the methodology for some of these studies, Matt, when when

you dig into it. There's some off putting stuff in the methodology. They're assuming sometimes that individual investors are invested in high cost funds and that an advisor is going to help you get into lower cost funds. But you know what, you might have been listening to the How the Money podcast and you're already investing in low cost funds, So that's not a benefit that a financial advisor is

going to bring you. But the problem continues because a lot of the financial planning services they measured aren't necessarily for younger folks and individuals in the wealth growing phase of investing, and so it's not just a yes or no answer. You have to dive into your own particulars as an investor as well as the specifics that a financial advisor can bring the table in order to help

you in your financial situation. Yeah. Man, that's right. So that's what we're going to cover today, the things that you need to know about advisors as well as what you need to consider about your specific situation, and hopefully by the end of this episode you should know exactly what your next step should be. So basically, we've got two prongs here. We've got you as the investor, and we've got the advisor, and we're gonna talk about some of the things that you should be looking for in

a financial visor. But first let's take a quick break, all right. That we're gonna dig to the heart of this question as to whether people should hire a financial advisor or not, and then how to find a good advisor if if it's appropriate for them a little bit later on, but first let's get to the characteristics of a good advisor. If you do find yourself wanting some expert help, what do you need to look for when you're shopping for the services that a financial advisor offers,

And so, Matt, let's break it down. A good financial advisor will first and foremost be a fiduciary, and they will be willing to provide a written guarantee of that. So if an advisor is a fiduciary, basically it's a fancy term that means that they prioritize your best interest over their own, and it eliminates the potential for a conflict of interest. I think if people take nothing else away from this, if they do shop for a financial advisor, the biggest thing they need to prioritize is that that

financial advisor is a fiduciary. That's the number one thing you have to make sure of before you sign on the dotted line to have them manage your money. Oh, totally, man and so like an example of you know, not being a fiduciary, they can tell you more expensive insurance or investments because they get a better cut on those products.

That's a clear conflict of interest. You know, after this federal rule was not past, some states are actually forcing the issues, like Massachusetts, which is by the way, that's where Treehouse is from and where Caitlin and Brian live. So Massachusetts has a lot going right for them. Yeah, right, But until this rule is widely implemented, then this is the first question that you need to ask of your

current um or a potential financial advisor. Yeah, for sure, and a good financial advisor in addition to being a fiduciary, they'll also be easy to communicate with. That that's why you want to interview a few advisors before deciding on the one that you want to go with. We don't necessarily click with everyone, Matt and I would suggest prioritizing finding an advisor that you can have a good conversation with. You don't want to avoid calling them because you hate

their communication style. Are they easy to reach, do they respond in a timely manner? And are they willing to use your methods of communication? Matt, I prefer email, Uh, maybe text message on occasion. But if I was working with an advisor that wanted to call me on the phone all the time even though I was trying to email them, I'd be so annoyed because I just don't want to talk like that. Like I'm a classic millennial who avoids using the phone for its actual purpose, which

is to talk to someone. When your phone rings, do you like freak out and like hide under the couch? Yeah, exactly what's the emergency? Do I need to respond right now? No, I'm totally with you, Like, focus on the channels of communication. That makes sense, right, Like, don't hit me up on Slack because I'm not on there, but send me an email and like, yeah, if it's an emergency, you can call or text, but there's rarely an emergency when it

comes to financial advising. Also, do not communicate via smoke signal, so don't try that either. Yeah, I'm not looking at this guy waiting to see what you got to say, uh, and your your financial advisor should also be pretty nosy. Are they digging in with lots of questions? If not, you might want to find another advisor to to be

able to handle your money. Well, they'll need to know a lot about you and your pacific goals, you know, going back to being a fiduciary, Like, it's hard to have your best interests in mind if they don't even know what your best interests are. Another thing that you're gonna want to prioritize when looking for a financial advisor

is are they willing to teach and educate you? Because if they want you to leave things to the pros and they're not willing to explain their reasoning or methodology, I think that's a big red flag, Matt, because part of the benefit of having a financial advisor should be these open ended conversations where you're also learning more about how the markets work and how they're investing your money. You want to more fully understand your plan. You don't want them just to kind of handle it right. You

want to be involved and have a say in the process. Yeah, different folks are going to be more prone to want to learn and to not learn, But you don't want to just have like a money guy or a money girl who just like takes care of all your money for you. It's important to learn. This is really important for someone like me who just really loves to understand the why behind things. Like that's just a question I asked,

I want to know how it works. Yeah, man, I've just read too many stories about oftentimes, you know, uber wealthy basketball players, NFL players, and the quote unquote financial advisor runs off with a lot of their money. And if it's more of a two way conversation about where your money is going, that's just kind of a harder relationship to get in. Exactly. Well, there's more accountability there when you're talking about it and where they're when they're

teaching you, because you yourself are providing that accountability. Um. I think one of the one of the biggest benefits that a financial advisory can provide is behavior modification and coaching as well. Like, if you make all of your money decisions so by yourself, it could be easy to sell assets in a moment of panic. A good financial advisor will help you avoid becoming your own worst enemy and will become a coach to push you towards saving

more and making even better money decisions in the future. Yeah. Man. A couple of weeks ago, we talked about the behavioral money decisions that wreck us and a financial advisor can walk alongside you and kind of help you avoid making some of those treacherous mistakes that you might make with with your investing or your savings. And I think another thing to mention, by the way, is the bogus credentials

that are out there for financial advisors. I mean, we we talked about that for a minute at the beginning of the show. How almost anybody can call themselves a financial advisor. There's not necessarily anything technical that needs to happen in order for you to do that. I'm a financial planner right right exactly? Or is that a money

coach or whatever it is. I mean, there's all sorts of different terms that people are using for how they help you with money now, and so to tell people out the thing that you want to make sure of when you are interviewing financial advisors is that the person that you're hiring is a CFP. That's the credential you most want your financial advisor to have. It's essentially the most rigorous credential and it requires years of schooling, a grueling test, and then years in the field to even

achieve that status. So you know that a person that is a Certified Financial Planner a CFP is going to have the time spent in the field and also the education necessary to be able to guide you appropriately in your money decisions. Another aspect that is important to know about a financial advisor that you're considering is that like how they're paid, Essentially, like you want to make sure that they have a transparent fee structure and that you

understand how they will be compensated. There are typically two ways that a planner makes a living um. One way is that they charge a fee, right like That fee can either be a flat fee for their services, an hourly rates based on how long or how often you meet with them, or their fee is based on a percentage of assets managed. And all three of these examples

of these are all called fee only advisors. And obviously there are different ways that these fee only advisors get paid, but that's our favorite kind of advisor for people to generally speaking, fee only advisors are good, yeah, for sure. The other way that advisors get paid is by commissions on the products they sell. It's harder to see how they get paid in this model, right, and different annuity and whole life insurance products often have higher commissions and

that's often why they're pitched by these financial advisors. These folks are called commission based brokers, but even fee based advisors can make money depending on the products they sell you. So it's always important to ask do you make commissions on any of the products you might sell me? And the response you get from a potential financial advisor is going to be telling. And am at a fine point

that I think we have to draw. Here is a fee based financial planner versus a fee only financial planner based versus only Just in case folks didn't hear it, I just wanted to say it again. Yes, So the fee only advisor essentially is one that is going to get a flat fee from you in one of the

three ways that you mentioned. A fee based advisor might have a similar arrangement with you, but if their fee based, that means that they have the option to make money from you in other ways, to like selling you high commission products. So a fee only advisor is the kind of advisor you want to look for because the payment arrangement that you have with them is just much more easier to understand. Yeah, man, that's a great question to

ask a potential financial advisor. And another thing to ask as well that I think a lot of folks might be hesitant to ask, is like just say, hey, like other ways for me to work with you where it could just cost less money? Do you offer any discounts? And an even bigger question is if you were to ask that person like, do you do you think I even need your services? Right? If you were to ask that question and they were to get back to you and say, to be honest with you, I don't think so.

How great is that they are turning down work, you know, like they're turning down the ability for them to a living and earn money because they know that this isn't what they would tell a friend to do, right man.

I know, for me, if I was in a situation like that, and and that's the advice that someone were to give me, like they've got a customer for life essentially right down the road when when it does come time for me to to hire a financial advisor, or if I have a friend who's a high earner, or they're in a tricky situation where they need some serious advice. I would totally tell them to go to that person, not based on personal experience, but like the interactions we've

had so far, you know, have been pretty good. Yeah, that sort of honesty goes a long way. Seriously, And so yeah, if a financial advisor says, you know what, you're not quite there yet, come back to me in a few years when you're earning more, when you have more complex financial decisions at hand, then I think I

can be a big help. But right now, do the basic things and just start investing more of your money in that work for a one k but really there's not a whole lot for me to contribute at this point, so you know what, keep doing it solo for the time being. Or maybe that's the way you can try to get a discount to be like, hey, man, if you cut me a break now, you know, like down the road, I'll be making a lot more money and I want to make you rich. I'll stick you for

the long haul. So I mean, yeah, I'm joking, but seriously, like, I think it's worth just having that conversation. Don't be afraid to talk about money, not just your money, but the fees that they would charge as well. It's I think it's a conversation that's worth having. Yeah, man, I agree, it's important as those questions up front before you enter into this long term relationship that's gonna have a major impact on so much of what happens with your money, right,

and so let's dig into the heart of this. Let's get into when people should hire a financial advisor, and we'll get into the things you need to consider before pulling the trigger right after the break. Al Right, best buddy, we're back from the break. We're talking about why not all financial advisors are bad, and let's go ahead and answer the question of when you should hire a financial

advisor specifically, let's cover some of the behavioral reasons. One of the best arguments for having an advisor has nothing to do with advanced knowledge of the markets and instead focuses purely on behavior. We kind of touched on this

before the break. But if you know that your own tendencies towards making emotional moves with your investments can cost you a lot and potential returns over the years, well, then a financial advisor can help you to stay the course, you know, Like I said, like we talked about the aspect of a good financial advisor and how they can be a coach. If you have someone there in your corner that is, you know, going to keep you from clicking cell, you know, as the market dips because you're

freaking out. Well, they're gonna be well worth the money that you pay. Yeah, man, I completely agree. If you know that you're susceptible to making rash money decisions, and a financial advisor can really help you focus and stay the course, that's huge. Also, if you just aren't interested in investing or finance really in general at all, i'd be surprised if you're listening to this podcast and that's

the case. But if you are one of those people, or if you know one of those people as well, right, yeah for sure. But but for those people who know they need to save for the future, but they just can't bring themselves to do it because their interest level just isn't piqued by this stuff and they have the money to do so, I think a financial advisor can make a meaningful difference and be the nudge that those people need to get started. If you see the necessity

behind it. But you're just unwilling to take action or learn the basic things in order to get started. A financial advisor can be the impetus to actually help you start saving for your future when you otherwise wouldn't. It's sort of like having a personal trainer. It's like if you know you're not going to go to the gym because I'm lazy, Like like, I'm not gonna get the gym because I just I would go to the gym. But if I hired a personal trainer, man, there's there's

a level of accountability there. Anytime you can introduce some accountability, regardless of what you want to call them. It just so happens that you call this accountability a financial advisor and you pay the money, but they're going to help keep you on track. I completely agree you. If a muscle bound person is gonna be barking in my face, I mean, that's gonna that's gonna give me the lift weights at at a different level than I probably would otherwise.

It's also worth considering hiring a financial advisor if you are a high earner, or maybe if you're self employed, if you're getting past the point of maximizing your traditional retirement accounts, maybe you want to invest more you could benefit from a financial advisor, or if you are in a particularly tough situation where there's a lot of money on the line. Maybe this is after a divorce or

after receiving a huge inheritance. Pretty much anytime there is a large quantity of money on the line where a slight misstep could cost you, I mean thousands or tens of thousands of dollars you know in interest or fees, Like that's a situation you want to avoid, or if it might just get put into the same these account and you might start using it slowly as opposed to

investing it for the future. I think a financial advisor can be a level head in a situation like that where there there's a lot of emotions that can prevail, especially in a divorce or an inheritance, Matt, there are a lot of other things going on, and so to have kind of a cooler head a financial advisor working to help you in the situation that can make a major difference in helping you make smart moves for the

long haul in a trying time. Yeah, it's also worth mentioning to that this might be a situation where not only does it call for a financial advisor, but maybe a tax attorney or a c P, A somebody who knows the ins and outs of the law who understands that you know the tax code and that the kind of specificity situation that you're finding yourself in, it's not just about investing the money. This is something that can span large aspects of our lives. So if that's you specifically,

make sure that you are are looking beyond the financial advisor. Yeah, man, I think we've covered some good reasons when financial advisors actually makes sense for people. And so if you are one of these people, well, how do you go about finding a good advisor? Obviously, like we mentioned earlier, you want to find an advisor who's going to be a fiduciary and they're gonna do with your money what's in

your best interest, not what's in their best interest. One of our favorite places for people to turn is x Y Planning Network, and that's because they only have relationships with advisors who meet the strict criteria that we've outlined. You're going to find an advisor who's fee only, who's a fiduciary, who cares about helping you no matter where you are in the process of building your wealth. Garrett Planning Network is another solid network out there, and we'll

put links to these in the show notes. Also, getting a referral from a friend who has had great experience with a financial advisor can be good, but you just need to make sure that you interview that financial advisor first, because maybe they really like them, but they don't see the fees or the negative things associated with the advisor that they're currently in a relationship with, and so you need to ask those questions still, even if it's a

recommendation from a friend. Yeah, if there's anything that we've learned from watching Parasite, it's don't only just don't only take the recommendation of a friend. Make sure that you dig in a little bit and do some research. Did you did you you watch Parasite? Right? Yeah, Finally we're talking about grown up movies. So that one was crazy. By the way, if you haven't watched it, I mean, would you recommend it? I would totally recommend Okay, Yeah,

it's pretty out there, but it's also really fascinating. I like weird movies like that. That was great. Okay, So let's talk about how often into what extent should people hire an advisor? Matt, I think this is something that people don't necessarily normally consider. You might not need an ongoing relationship with an advisor. Maybe you just want to check up every five years or so, or when you're

closing in on big life and money questions. And so for folks that don't necessarily want to pay one percent of their assets every single year to an advisor to manage their money, well, you can develop it is an ongoing relationship where you pay a flat fee every two or four or five years to that advisor to have a sit down chat and to be able to reassess

the situation that you currently find yourself. And I think that sometimes is a better way where you're not paying them nearly as much, but you are getting that expert help when you do feel like you need it. Great point, Man, So we've talked about how to find a good advisor. We've talked about maybe how often it's worth going in and checking in with one. But the question is now like should you hire a financial advisor? And Man, for most people, we're looking at you Pete and Pittsburgh. Who's

Pete in Pittsburgh. We've had like multiple questions. I think from Pete and Pittsburgh's right, So we're just gonna assume that there's a bunch of them there. Yeah, I think there's a lot, but no for real though, like for most people, we probably would not recommend hiring a financial advisor. If you're listening to this podcast and you're just getting started, there are some very basic steps that you can take in order to get your investing on the right track.

Read some some basic personal finance books. Some great investing books are out there, and then just keep listening how the money when When less money is on the line, you can afford to make some of these small mistakes as long as you learn from those mistakes, right, Like, hopefully you don't make any mistakes. Uh, you're taking a slow you're learning. Once you learn, you implement what you've learned.

You know, you can be methodical about it. You know, we're humans though, so unlikely they we're not gonna make any right now, That's right. We make some mistakes here and there. But what's so important, though, is that we learn from those mistakes. If you learn from those mistakes, like and I think there's no better way for us

to learn than life experience, especially when the stakes are low. Yeah, and when we're talking about the amount of money that we're gonna have in retirement, the stakes are kind of high when it comes to hiring a financial advisor. That's one of the things that we we haven't talked a whole lot about in this episode, but that's one of the reasons you would want to go it alone, is

because the typical fees associated with hiring an advisor. Most advisors are going to charge you a minimum of one percent of the assets that you have under management every year in order to manage your money and give you that advice. And so that's a high price to pay.

One percent sounds really low, but when you think about the compounding effect of that one percent fee that you're paying every year to that advisor, it can have a massive impact on what you're actually going to have in retirement. And so if you can go it alone, if you can develop confidence by listening to a podcast like this, by reading some good personal finance books Matt like you mentioned, that can save you those fees and help you to build greater wealth uh in your own life as you

go the d I Y route. Instead of hiring an advisor, Yeah, Joel. And one of the solutions to these high fees is if you're able to find a happy medium. Robo advisors they have completely changed the financial advisor space, but as much as they're able to offer, a lot of people still want a human to be able to talk to, no matter how good the betterment platform is right and how they can help you pay attention to your potential

behavioral misc use. Going with UH, you know, more of a full service like Vanguards Advisor Services might be a good solution for you, and they charge point three percent on assets under management. Another great solution might be Schwab

Intelligent Portfolios and the way they're pricing structure works. They have a one time fee of three d bucks and then after that they charge thirty dollars a month, and that will likely make the most sense for folks considering a human financial advisor because you get unlimited access to a CFP, an actual certified financial planner from Schwab. Yeah, Schwab and Vanguard both offer c FPS, which is the highest and best designation for a financial advisor, and that's

who we suggest you go with. And so if you do sign up through Vanguard or through Schwab for their expanded advisor services or intelligent portfolios. You're kind of getting the best of both worlds. You're getting the lower fees, but you're also getting access to humans who have gone through a lot of training to be able to help you with your finances in those questions that you have

over time. Man, I think a couple of years ago we talked about financial advisors a little bit and we mentioned this company called Grove, and they did a great job of charging people six hundred bucks a year and giving them access to a financial advisor that since I think has been sold, but I don't remember to who.

It was sold to, a big financial services company, But I really think Grove a massive impact on how these bigger companies charge for financial advice, and it's become a little more democratized, and these low cost investment companies like Vanguard and Schwab have done a really good job at offering you access to a human who's well informed. It can offer you good advice at just at a much lower rate than we would typically find or you've been

able to find over the past two years. Maybe Grove was purchased by Schwab and then they cut their prices in half. I don't remember if it was Swab. I gotta look that up somebody about Grove. Uh. I love what they were doing, but I also love what Schwab's doing, what Vanguard's doing now. And man, I think ultimately, when it comes down to the financial advisor decision, you know, we we wanted to talk about how financial advisors aren't

all bad. I mean, there's some great services they offer, and for some types of people it makes a whole lot of sense. But ultimately, uh, there's something that Adam Smith wrote two hundred years ago. I love reading old school authors every once in a while, and he said, managers of other people's money rarely watch over it with the same anxious vigilance with which they watch over their own. So I would say, ultimately, be careful with who you and trust to watch over your money. Uh, that you

have worked hard to earn. This is your money, and so who are you putting in charge of it? And we believe truly that those cheaper robo alternatives or one time or occasional guidance from a paid pro is likely all you'll need. Considering the wealth of information and the amount of tools that are at our disposal. Now, even for novice investors, there are amazing podcasts and incredible books. Just go to the library and check out a few

of them. The ability that we have now to be informed on what's happening with our money and how we can d I yat is unprecedented, and so I think for most people that's still the best way to go. But this was definitely worth talking about because there are some situations where people will want a financial advisor financial planner in their corner. It just kind of depends on their specifics and where they're at. Yeah, man, that's a

good word. And here's the thing too, For a lot of folks that might be new to personal finance, you may not feel like you have any interest at all, Like you have no attraction to money or personal finance.

And so those folks, I think we would both encourage you to just really dig into it a little bit more like read some great books will start, you know, continue to listen to the podcast, read articles online because I know, for me, I have found myself drawn to subjects and topics that I didn't find very interesting just from the actual process of digging into it. Right, Like, the more I learned about something, the more I'm kind of sucked into it and the more interesting it becomes.

It's kind of like when they made you read the classics in high school and you're like why, and yeah, now I love them. I can't get enough exactly. I think the same thing is true with our money, and and the payoff is there as well, because this is our own money. Like, we're not reading this to learn how to manage someone else's money. This isn't a job.

This is your own life. This is something that very much affects you, you know, Like we we don't necessarily call our podcast like a self help podcast, but that's sort of what we're talking about here. This is personal finance. And if you can find ways to manage this yourself and to just dominate your own personal finances, then you're gonna be in a fantastic spot, you know, years and decades down the road. Man totally agree. All right, let's get back to the beer that we had on this episode.

Today on the show, we drank a beer called Catharsis by Treehouse Brewing Company, one of the best breweries in the nation. Easily and listeners Brian and Haitlyn sent this one to us from Massachusetts, so big thanks to y'all and Matt. What are your thoughts on this beer? Well, dude,

this is a really good one. And Brian and Caitlin are crazy lucky because they said that this is like their local brewery essentially, like it's it's like thirty minutes away, and so for them just to be able to Waltzon whenever they want and pick up some beers, so jealous. Yeah, so incredibly jealous. But what's amazing about this beer, dude, is that you and I porters aren't necessarily one of our go to styles. I think we've both stated that before.

And what's amazing about this one, though, is that you can get that rich, that robust chocolate flavor without it filling you up. One of the reasons we do like stous is because the body is typically there, and that body kind of adds to the flavor. But somehow this beer doesn't need that additional body, it doesn't need that feeling, like that additional sense in order to complement this beer like, it's got enough flavor going on to be able to

kind of stand up on its own. And so because of that, this is one of the best porters I think I've ever had. It's just so well balanced and kind of has all the right flavors. Yeah. Man, if all porters takes it like this one, I'd be a convert immediately. This one is so good. I thought it had massive chocolate fudge notes in it and so yeah, the flavor profile was just incredibly rich and well developed, and that's just not something you find in a whole

lot of porters. Often times, I feel like they're a little bland, there's a little bit thinner. Yeah yeah, and this one just had a ton of flavor going on. It was delicious. A big fan of everything I've ever had from Treehouse and whatever. Beard of style. I think they set their minds to make they crush it. They can do it. Yeah. It's it's almost like this is like a porter concentrate. It's like, oh, maybe they forgot to to do this step where they're they're supposed to

deluted with water. Yeah yeah, yeah, because that's how most porter spaces is heavily deluded. Yeah, that's it's like a deluded style, whereas this kind of like, yeah, it just holds its own tastes so good. I'm incredibly thankful for Caitlin and Bryan for for sending this one our way. And have you ever even never been a tree House? Right? No? Never? Yeah, I haven't either. I think it's it's a good ways outside of Boston. I've been to Boston and I visited Trillium,

which is so good, another great brewery in Boston. But but yeah, Treehouse is just harder, like out of the country, right. Yeah, So if it's your neighborhood brewery, lucky for you, Brian and Caitlin. Yeah, so definitely pump them. We get to try this one on the show today. Man, Yeah, man, that's right. So that's gonna be it for this episode.

For listeners who are looking for show notes, we'll have some of those links up there with some of those different financial planning networks that we mentioned, as well as our full show notes up at how to money dot com. And if you're looking for some advice some help on how to find the right credit card for you, you don't need to hire a financial advisor, just go to

how the money dot com slash credit cards. Matt and I have listed the best credit cards for how you spend your money, how you can get the most rewards back based on the way that you typically spend in an average month, and so if you're looking for a new card, check that out. And if you sign up her card, it does help the podcast at the same time. All Right, Matt, that's gonna be it for this episode until next time, Joel, best Friends Out, Best Friends Out,