When is the right time to first visit a Financial Adviser?

“I’ve been meaning to get around to that” is one of the most common phrases we hear as Financial Advisers and it’s perfectly understandable as life gets busier and busier.

Unfortunately however, when it comes to your financial situation, there are many circumstances where delaying too long to could lead you into a “I should of…” situation.

Some of the common ones include:

• Taking out a credit card for a certain event like a holiday, and 5 years and thousands of dollars of interest later, it’s still in your wallet.

• Investing in something you don’t understand. One of the best investors in the world, Warren Buffett, is famous for proclaiming that he doesn’t invest in industries he doesn’t understand or are too complex, yet many individual investors do.

• Starting a business without doing proper diligence – How big is the potential client base? How profitable is the product or service? How many competitors will the business have? What is its competitive advantage?

• Not having a clear plan. A common one we see is people deciding to upgrade their family home to the maximum amount they can service on a mortgage or buying the latest new car on finance - often to ‘keep up with the Jones’s’. Any major decisions like this should only be made after running through a goal setting exercise where people prioritise their goals and then a Financial Advisor projects whether they are all possible. If not, can we amend the circumstances or base a new financial plan on re-prioritised goals?

• Not having adequate insurances. No one likes paying for insurance however they are none the less essential. The risk of not having insurances such as life insurance, home insurance, motor vehicle insurance is that the rest of your financial plan blows up.

Financial Advisers help tie up all the different elements of a person's financial situation so that there is no longer any ‘I should have’ moments. If you have any ‘I should’ moments, please reach out.