CBGE

About the financial crisis & how we cope with it

Finding a financial advisor to help you out

Handling your finances is not an easy job and most people find that they need help. This is why so many people use financial advisors. A financial advisor can really make your life easier but you have to make sure that you find a good one.

The first thing that you are going to have to do in order to find a financial planner is to make a list of potential candidates. There are various ways that you can do this but the best option is to get referrals from the people you know. Surely some of your friends and colleagues have financial advisors that they can recommend. If not you will have to look online or in the Yellow Pages. Either way compile a list of at least five financial advisors that you can investigate further.

The next step is that you are going to want to screen the potential candidates. This is going to be done by looking at their education and experience. You can use whatever criteria that you want but you are going to want to find somebody who has experience working with people who have a similar size portfolio to yours. You may want to find somebody who has a professional designation as this signifies a certain level of training but there are plenty of excellent financial advisors who do not have any designation.

The next thing that you are going to want to look at is how the financial advisor is paid. There are basically two options fee based and commission based. You want to make sure that you stick to a financial advisor who is paid by charging you a fee. The ones who are paid by commission are paid by the sellers of the products that they recommend to you. While this may seem ideal at first since you will be getting free financial advice the problem is that the advice is not unbiased. Obviously the advisor has a conflict of interest since his best interest is to get you to invest in the products they are selling and not necessarily the ones that are best for you.

The next step is to sit down with your potential financial advisor to discuss your needs. You will want to talk about your financial goals and ask how they plan to help you meet them. The most important thing is that you feel comfortable with the person that you hire. You also want to make sure that you get answers to any questions that you may have.

The last step once you have found an advisor that you are comfortable with is to do a background check. You are going to want to see their ADV form, this is a form that financial advisors have to file with the SEC. You are also going to want to check with your states securities regulators to make sure that no complaints have been filed against the advisor.