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Educate parents and young adults in practical money matters

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From Disinterested to Fully Engaged

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For the better part of my career in the financial world, I was somewhat of a disinterested investor.  Even though contributions were made to my retirement account, bills were paid on time, debt was kept manageable, credit cards were paid on time, and the bank account was never overdrawn – I wasn’t fully engaged.

What drew me in was not my own situation, but my father’s illness that left my mother in need of help.  Suddenly, it was critical that I step up my knowledge and involvement.  The urgency (for someone else’s benefit) was just the push that I needed and it changed everything, right down to my career path.

I spoke with Tara Siegel Bernard, personal finance reporter for The New York Times for my podcast, On Her Mind, and discovered a kindred spirit.  She, too, did not set out with the goal of writing about personal finance, but as her knowledge grew she found herself “aching to write about people and their stories” and ultimately started writing for a broader audience.

That authenticity enables her to reach readers and inspire them to take a more active role in their financial lives.

As a female, she is in a unique position to demystify personal finance for women.  As a working mother with young children, she faces similar challenges that many can relate to, which makes her advice practical.

If you know a disinterested investor, share the podcast and introduce them to Tara’s column.  That might be the nudge they need to get going in the right direction.

Introducing On Her Mind Podcast

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On Her Mind

Today I want to unveil my latest project:  On Her Mind, a podcast to address the many worries that weigh on a woman’s brain.  Whether you are a woman, or want to understand women better, this podcast sheds light on topics many want to learn about but resist asking about – things like money, careers, relationships, and aging parents.

My first guest is Carolyn McClanahan, who offers up insights on how to make a fresh start with your career path.  Carolyn has walked the walk by transitioning from ER physician to financial planner.  She shares the steps she took to design her life as her priorities changed, and offers practical advice on how to be brave enough to do the same.  I could have talked with her for hours; she is a wise soul with much insight to offer.

I hope you’ll listen, subscribe and offer feedback so I can make the podcast most useful to its listeners.

So why am I doing this?

Some 14 years ago, I found myself pushing my double-wide stroller into an unfamiliar church basement.  I was there for my kids, I told myself.  They needed to learn to separate from me.

The makeshift Mother’s Center had a Child Care Room that was manned by paid, experienced adults who were just one room away from the discussion room, in case the little ones needed a diaper change.  It was the perfect way to ease into separating while allowing for adult conversation.

This world was new to me.  I wasn’t one to join discussion groups and I wasn’t lonely or looking for friends.  In order to join, all mothers had to participate in an orientation class, which discussed their road to motherhood – from conception to birth and everything in between.

I wasn’t excited to share my tale of my difficult twin pregnancy that was in jeopardy almost from the moment we conceived.  I was tired of thinking about the bed rest, the hospital stays and their pre-term births.  Did I really need to dwell on how little sleep I was getting?  Did I want to tell total strangers what motherhood had changed in me?  Were there even words to describe the seismic shift?

There was another reason for my discomfort.  I wasn’t used to being in large crowds of women – my work experience in finance meant I had often been the only woman – or one of a few – in the room.  I didn’t want to hear gossip, judgment or backbiting and I wasn’t sure what the vibe would be in these discussion groups.  Even now, I am embarrassed by how judgmental I was being before I even entered the room.

Rarely in life have I been pleasantly surprised – but this was one of those times.

In a culture where no one likes to admit their struggles, these women shared their fears about losing themselves in motherhood, and trying to regain bits of themselves.  Some were slogging their way through post-partum depression, and released their feelings of loneliness and guilt.  Some had lost pregnancies or buried children and were dealing with trauma.  Others were grieving their deceased parents – or the fractured relationships that left them estranged.

We shared what successes we had in getting our kids to breastfeed, sleep through the night, and potty train; we shared our failures, too.  We swapped names of pediatricians.  We gave support to those dealing with marital or in-law stress.  We learned self-defense moves.  We encouraged one another to find parts of ourselves that were always there, before the children existed.  Some started businesses due to the boost in confidence they received there.

In a non-judgmental, supportive environment these women were a steel backbone for one another and frankly, I will always be grateful to them.  It was there I was asked to conduct a financial education group.  It was there I wrote my first personal finance article for the newsletter.

It was there I realized how ignorant these very capable women were about their money.  They were also particularly vulnerable, as many were stay-at-home moms who had left their careers to raise their kids.  Many were trusting that their husbands knew what to do – but they didn’t know for sure because they were not plugged in.  Motherhood was taking every bit of their bandwidth.

Fast-forward to today and I thought about the many roles we play in life.  Women, in particular, juggle many things – whether they have children or not.

I made a list of the most important roles I’ve served in my adult life – single career woman, married career woman, manager, daughter to aging/ailing parents, stay-at-home mom, parent-less daughter, mother to a seriously ill child,  entrepreneur/business partner, working mother … the list goes on.

I’m not unique.  We’ve all had experiences that have taught us invaluable lessons; these lessons would be much more valuable if shared with others struggling with these same challenges.

That is what I want to bring listeners every week.  I hope you’ll join me and share the podcast with others who could use some encouragement in all areas of their life — not just finance. I will tap the minds of successful women from diverse backgrounds, such as medical, legal, non-profit, media and business.  I will offer personal finance perspectives to demystify the jargon-filled world of investing and make it simple to understand.

Let me know what you struggle with because I want to help in any way I can.

My kids are now nearly 16 and a lot of living has gone on over the years, which means more ideas for content.

All I can say is stay tuned and see what you can apply to your life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

How an English Major Became an Advisor

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We live in a time when expressing an opinion and having an audience is as nearby as a cellphone.

We can always have lots of people agreeing with us, in fact – algorithms for social media, such as Facebook, guarantee that we will find our very own choir to preach to.

It makes us feel better to know others share our opinion; it makes us feel smarter, too.

If that is not enough, we get immediate gratification in the forms of likes, share, and retweets to make us feel bigger and more important than we really are.  If someone disagrees (respectfully, or not) we can fight them or block them – depending on how we feel that day.

But does this make us better, or just smug?

For someone in the position of advising clients – this can be dangerous.  Advisors can lose touch with what clients really need – which is first and foremost to be heard and understood.

A good advisor is like a doctor who cobbles together all the vague symptoms to get at what the real issues are.  It requires not latching on to an answer prematurely (like before questions have been asked).

Yes, sometimes things are fairly obvious and the course of action is straight-forward.  But, many times there are other fears, issues and concerns that are being expressed very subtly; and only a still mouth and focused ear can zero in on these details.

I had the pleasure of sitting on a panel to discuss deepening client relations.  The moderator was quite versed in social media, and we spent a lot of time discussing how to get more followers.  To be honest, that part of the discussion was not a place for me to add value.

While I use various social media platforms, that is not how I go deeper with my clients.  It is how others might find me and read my content.

My content (my blog) comes from what I hear, over and over from people too embarrassed, ashamed or nervous to share it with others.  It comes from walks I have walked (willingly and unwillingly).  In short, I try to share things I wished I had known, things that at times have baffled me or intimidated me — and continue to frustrate others.

When I was in college I had a lucrative side-job tutoring college prep kids.  Majoring in English, I mistakenly thought that writing would be a subject I would enjoy tutoring.  It turns out that the subjects I understood the best were like my ability to ride a bike – I had my balance, but couldn’t explain how others could find theirs.  It was hard to articulate what I intuitively knew.

I discovered my greatest talent was communicating subjects that had once challenged me (trigonometry and calculus, anyone?).  I understood what was confusing about the subject matter; and, most important, I had slogged my way out of the maze.

I liked putting others at ease so they could stop being self-conscious and learn.  Having found my way out, I delighted in giving others their chance to get on secure ground.  It energized me more than when I had rescued myself.

That is how an English major ended up an advisor.

My best clients are not the ones that want to talk about their rates of return.  They want to feel more in control of where they are headed.  They want to understand:

  • Why some of their fears are unwarranted (like worrying that an Index fund will go to 0);
  • Why some of their ideas are speculative (buying that “sure thing” marijuana stock);
  • What they can control (i.e., how much they invest, how long they stay invested, keeping their fees low, minimizing taxes, letting compound interest work its magic, and not selling when the market dips – but buying low, instead); and
  • Why they are not abnormal in their worries or ignorance (many are in the same boat).

I’m not interested in voicing my opinion to prove I know something; I’d much rather use my experiences to show others that I’ve been there, I understand, and I want to help them find some financial peace.

You can go ahead and tweet that.

 

Photo by Carolyn V on Unsplash

Planning for the “Big” Day

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One of the greatest “gifts” I ever received from my parents did not feel like a gift a first; it was a torturous exercise, truth be told.  Involving me in their estate planning would be something that would offer my entire family peace of mind, but not until much later down the road.

I did not ask to be involved; I actually was uncomfortable looking at my parents’ finances; it felt like TMI.

To put things in perspective, I was not a financial advisor at the time, nor was Tony.  I was in charge of marketing communications for a mutual fund company and Tony (an avid investor) was teaching history.  It was our experience with my parents’ planning that led us to the work we do now.

One of my brothers had helped them take care of the legal part of the equation – wills, health care proxies, trusts, etc. were in place.  But now, we had to make sure everything was titled as it needed to be and that beneficiaries and contingent beneficiaries were properly named (with seven children that was a lot of form-filling).

Assets had to be consolidated from numerous accounts; stock certificates needed a better home than the bedroom closet; their portfolio needed to be realigned based on their increasing medical bills; and investments my father bought back in the 1960s needed a price at purchase (cost basis).  Tony spent a good chunk of his summer break researching average share prices in the library (this was pre-internet).

Here is where the gift part comes in – when my father died in 2004, and my mother in 2015, there was no guessing about anything (not even the music played at the funeral Mass).  Our family was able to focus on being together and mourning my parents; we were not caught scrambling in a panic over the loose ends that we should have tied up when they were alive.

Money had been set aside in a bank account in our names to pay for all the expenses that would arise before the funds were disbursed.  No one was forced to charge thousands on a credit card to pay for the funeral arrangements.

When the heart is heavy, any complications can feel overwhelming; minimizing decision-making is a tremendous help.

Yet, according to the Financial Awareness Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to raising financial awareness and literacy, 120 million adults in the U.S. do not have an estate plan in place.  This leaves them and their loved ones in a precarious position.

People mistakenly think that estate planning is for millionaires, and not the average person.  That is simply not true.  Yes, people with significant assets have more complexities; but everyone needs to have a plan in place to ensure a smooth transition in the event of illness, mental incapacity or death.

I am fortunate that my colleague, Gary Pulford, has experience with the potential issues that can threaten a plan; he is a wealth of information.  You should consult with an estate planner to address your specific concerns, but here are a few basic elements you should have in place:

  • Planning for right now – It is more likely for you to become impaired than to die; becoming mentally incapacitated is not limited to a long-term illness, like dementia.  Anyone can have an unfortunate accident or suffer a stroke.
    • A durable power of attorney will enable someone to handle financial decision-making responsibilities (check-writing, managing assets, etc.). This form must be on file with each institution and on every account that you want to grant someone control over should you become unable to manage your affairs.
    • A living will enables you to state your wishes regarding medical care or end-of-life decisions and a health care proxy allows you to appoint someone to make health care decisions on your behalf.
  • Beneficiaries on IRAs/Roth IRAs and Retirement Plan Accounts – Assets in these accounts are not governed by the will, so make sure the beneficiaries/contingent beneficiaries are the appropriate people.  Divorces, deaths, and the arrival of children/grandchildren may have occurred since you last reviewed your accounts.  Those inheriting the accounts only need to provide the death certificate, so these assets can transition to the heirs very quickly.
  • TOD on Bank Accounts and Taxable Investment Accounts – TOD or “Transfer on Death” acts much like a beneficiary designation works on a retirement account. It allows assets to move seamlessly to heirs once a death certificate is provided.
  • Last Will and Testament – A will gives instructions on how an estate should be handled when someone passes.  It also appoints guardians (for the care of minor children or impaired adult children); trustees (to manage the money and the disbursements); and an executor (who collects and distributes the assets).  It can be used to distribute non-retirement investment assets (without a TOD in place); and hard assets, such as homes, real estate, vehicles and other personal property.  The will is only valid if it is in compliance with the probate laws of the state.  If you have moved to another state, your will should be reviewed.  Likewise, if your will is not current, you should review it to make sure it accurately reflects your wishes.

Among its free publications, the Financial Awareness Foundation has a free downloadable set of forms to organize and document your financial, personal, and family data.  It has an exhaustive list of items to gather, but do not be put off by this.  Rather, use the parts that are only relevant to you.

For a more basic list, check out a blog I wrote a long time ago when I deemed estate planning as an unpleasant task.

I understand why this is a chore many avoid – I really do.  But I can also say – as the daughter of parents who did the right thing – when you have this in place, it removes some stress off of your loved ones at a time when their hearts are burdened enough.

Let that be your parting gift.