We tend to model our lives, and our financial plans, as a straight, uninterrupted line moving upward and to the right. We assume that our income, our capacity, and our circumstances will remain relatively constant, simply growing steadily over time. But life is rarely linear. It is cyclical. It operates in seasons. An accurate graph could look more like hills and valleys than a steady incline or staircase. There are seasons of aggressive accumulation, where you […]
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How strong is your financial plan?
Two key goals of a financial plan are to help you grow what you have, and help you protect what you have. This is why conversations about financial planning should pay attention to your short-term cover. Everyday insurance is a critical piece of your long-term wealth strategy and helps ensure the perimeter around everything you own is secure. In some ways, building wealth is a lot like managing a sports team: you need both an offensive […]
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Why good health is a financial strategy
When we sit down to project a client’s retirement, one of the biggest variables we have to account for is longevity. Thanks to modern medicine, we are living longer than any generation in human history. From a financial planning perspective, a longer life means your capital has to stretch further. But there is a glaring blind spot in how most people plan for these extra decades. We assume that because we are living longer, we will […]
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Don’t avoid the struggle
Here’s why money shouldn’t buy your way out of friction. There is a common, unspoken assumption about wealth that many internalise early in life: we believe that the ultimate purpose of money is to reduce or eliminate our problems. We view a well-funded balance sheet as the ultimate shock absorber. We assume that if we just have enough capital, we can insulate ourselves, and the people we love, from discomfort, failure, and friction. But this is […]
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Empty nest financial planning
There is a very specific kind of quiet that descends on a house when the children finally leave. It affects our hearts, but it also affects our financial planning. If you’re in this situation, or know someone who is, here’s a little of the new reality… For a couple of decades, the home has been a logistical headquarters. It has been filled with the noise of scheduling, the hum of constant activity, and the heavy financial […]
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Talking to your family about money
As the playwright George Bernard Shaw famously observed, “The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.” Nowhere is this more evident than in our family conversations about our financial lives. We often assume that because we share a home, a surname, and a bank account with our loved ones, we inherently share the same financial goals. But in many households, money remains a deeply taboo subject. We happily discuss our […]
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Guarding the basecamp
When we sit down to build a financial plan, our eyes are naturally drawn to the summit, not the basecamp. We focus our energy on the big, inspiring goals: retiring with dignity, leaving a meaningful legacy, aiming for financial independence or funding our children’s education. We engineer our long-term investments to weather global economic storms and compound beautifully over decades. But in our rush to conquer the mountain, we often forget to protect the basecamp. A […]
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They may not show up on your statement
One of the metrics used extensively in the financial profession to evaluate a given decision is the Return on Investment (ROI). It’s used in other areas too, like in marketing and operational planning meetings for larger companies and corporations. This metric drives us to optimise portfolios to chase the highest possible yield. We scrutinise management fees, track our compound interest, and celebrate when the graph moves up and to the right. In the world of wealth […]
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Redefining true financial wellbeing
When working with a qualified and experienced financial planner, you should have a partner who will be exceptionally well-positioned to diagnose a balance sheet. They can easily spot a gap in risk cover, identify underperformance in a portfolio, and structure a tax-efficient estate plan. We are taught to read the numbers like a novel. But what happens when the mathematics are perfect, yet the person holding the portfolio still cannot sleep at night? We often sit […]
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Invisible ink
Have you ever thought about the unspoken money scripts we pass to our children? As parents, we often assume that teaching our children about money requires a formal sit-down conversation. We plan to wait until they are teenagers to explain the mechanics of a budget, the danger of credit cards, and the magic of compound interest. But the truth is, your children are already learning about money every single day. They are incredibly observant. Long before […]
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