For those of us who don’t have a head for budgets or math, anything financial we have to deal with is an intimidating chore. Balancing the check book, understanding your online statements, choosing a student loan payment plan — all of these activities give us nervous hives.
Fortunately, there are just as many people in this world who think the tomes of Shakespearean poetry that line our walls are deadly dull but genuinely enjoy financial planning. Some of these people (helpfully) choose to grow up and become financial planners.
Hiring a financial planner may cost you a bit up front, but the money a financial planner might make you and save you in the long run is almost definitely worth it. Here are just a few of life’s money-oriented areas that a financial advisor can help you tackle:
1. Financing and Debt Management
Do you constantly get reminder emails from your school or car company to pay your bills — and then dump those emails into a folder only to forget they exist? Yeah, we do too. A financial planner can help you understand your debt and guide you through your repayment options. They can also indicate what is interest and what is principle and help you to avoid ballooning interest charges by creating an organized repayment system you can stick to. Finally, a financial advisor can help you mitigate future liabilities by identifying what is “good” debt and what is “bad” debt based on interest rates, your debt to income ratio, etc.
2. Enterprising Activities
Maybe you have debt management under control, but you’ve been thinking about starting a small business and have no idea where to start. A financial planner can walk you through the money side of things and help you with break even analyses as well as illuminate you on the business tax law in your state. They can also identify what information you’ll need to keep track of should you start this business.
3. Investments
Maybe you were left a lot of money, have a big 401k, won the lottery, or already started a clutch quilting business on Etsy that really took off. If any of these applies to you, then first off congratulations. Secondly, we highly recommend that you contact a financial planner who can help you invest some of this money smartly in stocks, bonds, securities, etc. and increase your understanding of 401k bench marks.
4. Retirement and Estate Management
Currently 20% of the U.S. population close to retirement has absolutely no money saved, and only a little more than half of the population currently participates in any sort of formal savings plan for retirement. That, to us, is terrifying. Hiring a financial planner now can help you avoid being in that 20% and expose you to different, low-stress ways of saving, such as an IRA account or a high-interest earning bank account. A financial planner can also walk you through your assets and help you parse them out for a will or a trust fund.
Don’t be victimized by money math. Own your financials, and if you can’t understand them, find someone who can!
