If You’ve Never Worked with an Advisor Before
Your guide to what to expect, how we work, and answers to your most common questions.
Is this the first time you’ve considered working with a financial advisor? If so, you probably have lots of questions—and even some concerns. We’re here to help you feel confident and comfortable before your first appointment.
Don’t Be Nervous to Schedule a Consultation
We don’t bite, we promise!
What prompts someone to finally start searching for an advisor can be somewhat unique, but often it’s because you have a financial situation that you no longer feel comfortable handling on your own, and feel like maybe an expert’s opinion will be helpful.
Perhaps you’re struggling with debt, or suffered a job loss, or are worried about getting a child through college, or whether you’re on track for retirement at some point. There are many reasons people finally “pull the trigger” and book some Q&A time with us.
Your First Meeting(s)
We’re legal fiduciaries. That means, we need to make sure our recommendations are always in your best interests.
That includes whether it’s in your interests to work with us at all!
To help us both make that determination, and so that you never have to worry about a “sales pitch”, we follow a specific seven-step process to get acquainted, learn about your needs, and craft a strategy. Only after this work is complete (and you’ve had time to review our ideas and even interview other advisors), we’ll invite you to come on board.
We never charge for these initial consultations or any of the pre-client work we do, so rest easy.
We follow a careful process so that you can decide, on your own, whether to work with us or not.
In-Person or Virtual – Your Choice!
Some clients like meeting the “old school” way – in our office. But most of you really like the convenience of meeting virtually. We’re good with either, and you have the option of selecting the kinds of meetings you want every time you schedule. our advisor will welcome you without a specific agenda. This is on purpose, because we don’t sell any products and we don’t know how (or even if) we can help your situation yet. Our job at this meeting is to let you open up and share what prompted you to find us in the first place. Unless you have lots of questions for us, expect that 80% or so of your first visit will be time for you to share your situation with us. Your advisor will ask questions to help us gain better understanding and clarify what your needs are,
Sometimes prospective clients are ready to get started with us right away after this session. Others want additional information or are in the process of “shopping” financial advisors, and that’s fine. Your advisor will explain the next steps to you should you decide to move forward.
Coming On Board
The decision to become a client will always be yours, without any pressure from us. Either we all agree we’re a good fit for your needs, or we don’t.
Once you come on board, the scope of our work (financial planning, investing, or both) will be planned out and we’ll prioritize what needs to be done first. We’ll provide you with our regulatory disclosures and we’ll both sign a client agreement that covers the work we plan to do.
Each onboarding experience is unique because we don’t know ahead of time where your investment accounts need to be transferred from, etc. So we start by collecting information from you, which we do with secure online forms.
We’re with you every step of the way.
A huge majority of our clients remain with us for many years (even decades!). This is something we take great pride in.
However, we now that getting started can feel overwhelming and, if this is your first time, a little confusing and uncomfortable. That’s why we spend extra time early on in our relationship, to get you feeling “up to speed”.
The first 90 days as a client can be a flurry of paperwork and meetings as we map out an investing strategy and transfer in your assets, or begin work on your financial plan. Once things are settled and in place, our relationship will calm down , and we’ll begin a series of regular communications and contacts. Typically, our clients want communication from us about their plan/accounts once per quarter, but we’ll of course be in touch as often as necessary.
We communicate with our clients in a variety of ways:
- Urgent Matters that need your immediate attention – text message or phone call
- “FYI” messages – sent as needed by email from us and your investment custodian
- Regular communication with your primary advisor
- Regular Blog and Social Media Posts – as many as 5 a week!
- Our “Letter to Clients” – a quarterly email from CEO Jeremy Torgerson
- Personal Video Messages (like a Zoom meeting you can watch anytime) – by email
- Planned Meetings – twice per year, we get together to review specific action items and make sure your investing and financial plan is on-track. However, if you want to discuss something right away, you don’t need to wait until your next scheduled meeting to talk about it; our team’s calendar is always available, 24/7.
