Squam Lakes Financial Advisors’ experience comes from 30 plus years of financial planning for doctors and other health professionals. We typically meet doctors after they have been burned by other “advisors” who sold them products that may not have been in their best interest.
A fee-only financial planner can help physicians take a holistic view of their finances, identify goals and risk, and create a plan, to protect and grow their wealth through retirement and beyond. A fee-only planner acts in a doctors’ best interests to create this plan and uses the plan to identify needs for investment and insurance products, if applicable.
If an advisor recommends that you need $1,000,000 of life insurance and I happen to sell life insurance for a living, whose interests are being served? Can you trust that you’re getting the best product for your unique needs, or are you simply getting the product that would give your advisor the best commission? When your banker introduces you to his or her “investment specialist” whose solution to all of your investment needs is annuities that pay the bank a commission, whose needs are being served?
In the world of finance, insurance, and investments, medical practitioners hold a special place in marketing plans. As they begin their residency, regardless of their chosen field of specialization, doctors are expected to have significant levels of income at some point in the future.
Insurance companies and banks are aware of this, and put forth special incentives that are not available to others in the marketplace. Some examples:
Financial planning for doctors is a specialized skill, and the majority of financial planners are hard pressed to address the medical market. Most planners base their fee structure on the management of portfolios, and many physicians may be years away from being able to accumulate assets. Sales professionals may base their recommendations on their own needs, rather than you and your family. We suggest your plan reflect alignment with your goals, with the plan and the need for products will flow from the plan.
Start with an advisor who is paid for planning and not for the sale of products. Begin with a “Comprehensive Financial Plan” and a “Fee-Only” financial planner whose sole source of income comes directly from his clients. The alternatives are Planners who are “Fee Based” or “Fee and Commission” hybrids. Insist on “Fee-Only” 100% of the time and, you’ll know the financial planner is looking out for your interests above his own. We act as your fiduciary in all of your dealings. This means that, by law, we must always act in your best interest. Your needs are put ahead of our own.
Give us a call. There are no fees for our initial meeting. Let’s meet to see if we can be of help and if we are comfortable with each other. Let us begin to assist in improving your current and future lifestyle while you spend your time providing preventive care for your patients. for more detail, please see our Comprehensive Financial Plan
