Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Any financial planners here?

I was trying to be concise.

No, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. How may I help you?

....study 80 to 100 hrs per week, for 2 months???????
I am not a financial planner, but that averages over 14 hrs per day. sounds like a heck of a lot.

Hyperbole??? $5k CPA, harder than the CFA. With all due respect the Texas CPA exam costs less than a grand and the CFA is debatably more difficult. With that said good luck with your profession. Your hard work and drive will be rewarded over time. -tnscouter

I've held a few licences. Series 6, 7 ,8 ,9, 10, 24 and 63, and trained the licensing test for a couple of firms.
I scored a 99% on the Series 6, and over 95% on the Series 7. Over 95% they will no longer give you your score.

I've seen many people fail it 3 times and loose their employment opportunity.

Over the years I have attempted to make maximum contributions to my IRA each year and my wife has taken advantage of her 401K and employer contributions. We are by no means wealthy but have experience with lower level financial planners. A lot of the comments here appear cynical, but there is a lot of truth to them. I have observed that the lower level financial planners that have their offices on main street are mostly salespeople. The company has a computer model. They ask you to fill out a questionaire that analyzes your risk factor, age, marital status, etc. They score this questionaire and come up with ratios for investment based on risk (high risk, low risk, bonds, income, international, etc.). They then sell you products that fit into that risk scenario. They never make any predictions or recommendations. They have certain mutual funds with which they do business and they detest silver and gold. They are very careful to avoid anything for which they could be held responsible. They do the same thing day after day and have very little knowledge of what is going on in the market, politics or the world. As said before, they represent the company for whom they work, not the client and they are in business to sell products. No different than car salespeople or pharmaceutical salespeople.

As a result we took advantage of every downturn in the market, having to start over about three times. When the market was doing well, our investments always underperformed and we were recommended to stick it out. "The stock market is a long term investment." This last year, I have been pleased with the performance of our investments, but that is not to the credit of the financial planners. Any investment manager should have been able to make money in this market.

I have a friend whom I would consider wealthy. He invests his money with managers who invest that money in the financial markets. He once told me when you put two to five million with a manager, you have a right to expect them to perform. If they don't you pull the money and put it with a different manager. It gets their attention and gives them an incentive.

Short story long, there are different levels of financial planners. Those who work for companies like Edward Jones are simply salespeople and are probably paid commission. Some are very successful, but there has been a large turnover in our area and none of them are what I would consider exceptional people. Investment brokers, that deal with large accounts have some "skin in the game" and have an incentive to perform. They have to follow market trends, know the stock market and make sound decisions. Sink or swim it is up to them. When their client makes money, they make money. That simple.

pretty much my experience.

commission based financial planners are right down there with used car salesmen. if you would want to go that route, i would suggest getting your training, degree, certs, whatever, yourself and learning how to advise people ethically for both yours and their benefit. in other words, a fee based advisor, not tied to a firm selling loaded mutual funds and piss poor insurance policies. in my younger days i was sold a bill of goods a couple of times and in the long run lost or made very little money, which is the same thing. but i learned a valuable lesson. personal finance is not hard to learn and the best move i ever did was to get away from those fuggen vultures.

Edward Jones ought to be a good outfit to work for. My experience would suggest that they are expensive and churn accounts. They should be able to pay sales people well with their high priced service. I just use USAA and do it myself. $8.95 per stock trade and I don't think they charge if you buy USAA no load mutual funds. Of course if you do business with EDJ you can go in and be schmoozed a little and made to feel as if you are somebody.

Dave Ramsey seems hard against ETFs. Does anybody know the downside to an ETF vs a mutual fund?

You may be the most brilliant person I know of that can’t spell LOSE. Couldn’t resist.

Spell check is my worst enema.

Many people dont like ETF's . In a crash or fast downturn they are harder to sell according to some people. A mutual fund does not work quite like that . It sells at the end of the day . This is kind of like asking for six but complaining you got a 1/2 dozen. The real reason many dont like ETF's is cause they are no load and my ETF's charge .08% ( $80 per $100,000 expense ratio) Most mutual funds charge 1% if they are managed or $1,000 per $100,000 invested. My ETF's are doing better than most of my managed mutual funds. I just can't stand the way " financial advisors " treated me. One was such a jerk I pull our money out even though my son was working there. Embarrasing to say the least. The made him miserable, and accused him of everything that went wrong. They ended up firing him and he is not sure he wants to be in finances. He is very good at it and I dont think it is luck anymore. I just wonder what God has planned for him. He did 30% last yr, 28% in 2016 and 8% in 2015 and was only in th market for 2 months. As for investing . The Vanguard Total Stock Market fund did 19.85% . I did 19.86% so we were dead even but I did it with 8% bonds and a non Traded REIT ( dont ever buy one . The jackass " investor " talked me into it ) SO I guess I can say I beat the market but not really worth the research.

My Edward Jones agent started out as a Billboard Salesman, made a good living at it too.
College grad, but not sure in what.
He's been a financial planner for the past 15 years and is doing very well at this too.
My old financial planner was a college drop-out, but had the smarts and personality to sell,
he finally retired this year worth a whole lot more than me. That's why I switched to EJ
Good luck, I hear it takes years to build your clientele, if you're young enough to work through the lean years, hustle and treat your clients well so they recommend you, you can make a nice living.

Thank you for the compliment, and yes, spelling is not my strong suit.

There was a nice guy here went by Safarimam. He knows all about being an honest financial advisor.