A Fee-Only Advisory Firm-Why Work With One?
You have some expectations from a financial advisory company on how it is possible to save, invest and grow your hard-earned cash when you hire them. The financial adviser ought to offer sound financial advice, be independent and professional. In case you have not hired a Fee-Only financial advisor, you might not get what you signed up for.
There are over 200,000 financial advisors in the United States, and this number is expected to rise in the coming years. But of these, only about 2,000 are fee-only and are registered with the Personal Financial Advisors Association. Financial advisers who charge dependent on the transactions earn their money from commissions that they make from selling financial products. But, fee-only advisory companies don’t sell any merchandise; thus they don’t work on commissions. Instead, their customers pay them a flat fee for the individual financial advisory services that they provide rather than from the investments they recommend.
A lot of the financial advisory firms are commission-based which means that their income is linked directly to the investments and financial products they sell to you. These firms might call themselves financial advisors but they are majorly interested in promoting their merchandise. Hence, they may suggest some financial products more than many others since they would like to make a commission from them. Thus, it is quite difficult for you to assess whether the investment portfolio they have recommended is most suitable for your portfolio.
On the other hand, fee-only advisory firms like Financial Fiduciaries LLC do not earn any commissions since they do not sell any financial products. Thus, clients know that fee-only advisors work for their best interests and are not attached to any investment product or company. As a result of this, they give impartial and independent investment, and they do not have any conflict of interest. They can freely recommend products and investments which are best suited to their clients.
However, look out for firms that use fee-based rather than fee-only as these two are not the same. Fee-based financial advisors accumulate both fees and commissions and they may also recommend some goods endorsed by the sponsoring companies.
A fiduciary is a fiscal expert who’s held out in trust and has the legal responsibility to put the clients’ interests above their own. Fee-only financial experts like Thomas Batterman are the only financial experts that work under a suitability standard. Federal regulators and the State regard fee-only financial advisors highly which gives you more reasons to choose Fee-only financial advisory firms.
Prior to picking a financial advisory company, do some due diligence and research on it. Ask several questions prior to entering into a professional relationship with a financial advisory company.