Feb 28, 2020
This week, I’m talking about the fiduciary standard in the world of financial advice. What is a fiduciary and why should you care?
We’ve done a pretty deep dive on the fiduciary issue this week, and I hope as a result you have a better understanding of how to pick out a fiduciary, and why you should work with an advisor who will act in your best interests.
Today, I want to talk about what to do if your advisor isn’t a fiduciary. The good news is that the advisory industry is moving more and more in that direction. 20 years ago, finding an advisor who wasn’t paid commissions and always acted in a fiduciary capacity was quite rare. Now it’s a lot more common. At my company, True North Retirement Advisors, we are fiduciaries to our clients and that was a very strategic decision we made when we started our firm, because we wanted to be able to say to all of our clients that we are working for them exclusively and aren’t conflicted in our advice.
So what do you do if you’ve been working with your advisor for a while and they’re not a fiduciary. Do you need to go find a new advisor? I think the answer depends on how well you know your advisor and how much you trust them. If you’ve been working with your advisor for 30 years, they’re your best friend, your kids godfather, and you trust them with your life, then fiduciary status is less important. You know them well and you trust them.
If however, you have doubts about your advisor, they seem to have put you in some odd investments over the years that you suspect had high fees or high commissions, or they only seem to call you to sell you something, that should be a red flag that you are working with an advisor who is self-serving and doesn’t actually care about putting your needs first.
As I mentioned earlier this week, the more you arm yourself with information about how your advisor gets paid and understand whether or not your advisor is a fiduciary or not, you’ll be better equipped to make an informed decision about whether or not this person is someone you can trust to give you sound advice that’s in your best interest.
That’s it for today. Thanks for listening. My name is Ashley Micciche and this is the One Minute Retirement Tip.
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