Your Clients’ Retirement — More Than Just Money!

William and Sharon were driving home from a meeting with Alan, their financial advisor to talk about their retirement plans. William had decided that he would leave his work next year and Sharon would continue to work for another couple of years. The couple had been diligently saving for “the big day” when they could consider themselves fully retired and now they had actual dates in mind.
 

3 Ways to Use Technology to Help Your Aging Clients

I was recently presenting at a retirement education event, where the age range of the audience and speakers was between 40 and 85 years old, when we started to experience technical difficulties.

Do You Offer What Retirees and Pre-Retirees Are Looking for?

Mark and Wanda Taylor, a couple on the verge of retirement, have decided to fire their financial advisor. “We are not really sure about how to plan for retirement,” Wanda told us at a recent workshop. “What we are most uncomfortable with is that we aren’t convinced that our advisor understands how to plan for retirement either!”
 

Not Your Parents’ Retirement!

“I remember when my parents retired,” my client Sue told me as we sat down to talk about her and her husband Brian’s retirement plans. “They both quit at 65 and looked forward to traveling in their fifth wheel to visit friends and family around the U.S.”
 

Ten Steps to Becoming the Retirement Advisor Your Clients Need

If you’re looking for ways to become more integral to your clients this year, here are some ideas that Barry LaValley, founder of the Retirement Lifestyle Center, presented at our 2016 National Education Conference:

There is Always a Reason to Sell…Unless You Want to Achieve Your Goals

This article is featured in the fall edition of our 360 Insights Quarterly Client Newsletter.
 
The problem with good advice is that it tends to be boring, especially when it comes to your portfolio.
 
This is a good thing.
 
For investors, excitement can be your worst enemy. Excitement generates headlines; it causes people to be greedy or fearful; it drives volatility and speculation — all resulting in too many people compromising their financial futures.

Highlights from our National Education Conference

At Loring Ward’s recent National Education Conference in San Diego, more than 150 financial advisors gathered to learn new ideas from industry experts and from one another. Here is just a sample of what they heard:
 
“We are honored that you have decided to entrust so many of your clients’ savings to us…and the hopes and dreams these savings represent. Helping clients with the challenges and opportunities of aging and navigating retirement is becoming increasingly important. This is personal for all of us. We want to help you help your clients, but we all have parents and grandparents who need help and guidance throughout retirement.”
Alex Potts, President and CEO, Loring Ward
 
“If you specialize in retirement, does it say that on your website? Could I go on your website and get links to Medicare, AARP and other resources to help with retirement? If you are a retirement advisor, you should be the source of information — and not just financial information — for your clients.”
Barry LaValley, president, Retirement Lifestyle Center
 

Are You Ready to Become an Exceptional Retirement Advisor?

“Are you fully prepared to support your clients’ needs all the way through retirement?”
 
This was the challenge that educator and retirement authority Barry LaValley threw out to almost 200 financial advisors at the recent Advisor Group ConnectED Conference in Washington, D.C.
 
LaValley, who was presenting in partnership with Loring Ward, noted that traditionally, investment and financial planning focused on positioning the client for the future.
 
But with approximately 10,000 Baby Boomers turning 65 every day, the future is here NOW.

A Checklist for Retirement

With life expectancy rates increasing, an abundance of information at everyone’s fingertips and more options than ever before, it can be difficult to know where to start when it comes to planning your future in retirement. While the possibilities may seem endless, adding a little structure and organization to the thought process can provide your clients with clarity and direction that allows them to breathe a little easier…and opens the door for you to guide them. For your clients who are approaching this phase of their life, consider sharing this self-assessment tool to create a catalyst to important conversations.

Retirement Advice…from a Comedian?

Recently, retirement was the subject of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver on HBO. (Note: The video contains some adult language.) The news satire program typically does a segment each week of “edutainment” and this time Mr. Oliver focused on a number of investing topics: financial advisors, annuities, what is a fiduciary, and the large impact fees have; he even goes into detail on the show’s own John Hancock 401k plan.
 
Oliver makes several important points, such as investors should know the fees they’re paying, they should work only with an advisor who is a fiduciary and active management can be expensive and rarely works. Oliver prescribes 5 steps every investor should take:

Medi-What?

Being uniquely positioned to help your clients navigate through the last third of their life goes hand in hand with expanding your support to include guidance on age-related challenges and programs.
 
In my recent travels, I got a healthy dose of how positioning yourself as this type of resource deepens the relationship with your clients and empowers them to make informed decisions about their overall well-being. At an advisor’s client event, Medicare was the topic that came up and it was clear it was daunting to comprehend. The confidence in the room rose visibly when the advisor was prepared to discuss how it works and what it covers. I could see his clients relax and engage which really highlighted to me how important it is to be comfortable with the basics.

Your Clients are Someone Else’s Prospects

Knock, knock.
Who’s there?
Someone soliciting your plan sponsor clients…

For advisors with current retirement plan relationships on the books, regardless of the providers you’ve chosen to use, come August fresh 5500 data gets injected into the marketplace via plan search engines that many firms use as a prospecting tool to solicit new business.

Retirement Planning – Taking Control During Uncertainty

Floor-Leverage Rule Spending Simulation¹
 

 
Total assets in individual retirement accounts and defined contribution plans have grown more than 400% over the last 18 years from $3 trillion in 1995 to $12.4 trillion in 2013 according to Investment Company Institute (2014)². More importantly, these assets as a percentage of the total retirement market have grown to 54%, which indicates that the responsibility of managing investments is shifting towards individual investors. The need to assist these individuals with managing their retirement assets is growing.

Ready for Her-tirement?

With respect to retirement readiness, it is not uncommon to read articles that focus on the lack of confidence more women feel than men as it relates to their ability to retire with comfort and dignity.