Great wealth management advice should cost you much less in the long term than no advice at all. Not all advisors are the same, but if you do find a great one, it’s important to think about the overall value they can provide when considering costs.

A Great Workout

Hiring a wealth advisor depends on your specific financial needs. The decision to hire a wealth advisor could free up valuable time, reduce stress levels, and potentially thousands of dollars in untapped after-tax wealth.

Hiring experts to increase performance is not exclusive to wealth management. Many people compare wealth advisors to personal trainers. In the gym, your trainer bears the responsibility of planning – you communicate your goals, the trainer reviews them and comes back with a plan to achieve them. When you’re having trouble understanding an exercise, they’re available for guidance.

A wealth advisor serves a similar purpose. A great advisor will listen to your goals and come back with a plan to meet them. When you’re struggling with what to do next, your advisor can guide you with clear recommendations and help you to stay on track.

An advisor can help educate, hold you accountable, and reaffirm your commitment to your wealth goals. Just like a personal trainer can jump-start your results in the gym, the right advisor can help you build and grow your wealth.

The Hidden Costs of Going It Alone

While it may seem that handling your own finances personally can save you money, this is only partially true, and often only in the short term. Without expert guidance, there’s a high likelihood that you’re leaving money on the table. Sure, you may save on fees today, but you’ll potentially pay much more in lost wealth in the future.

A study by Vanguard suggests that a good wealth advisor can add as much as 3% net returns to your overall portfolio. The additional returns are not driven by “beating the market” but rather by helping you to avoid behavioral-bias-driven investment mistakes and by helping you to implement a cost and tax-effective strategy.

Personal wealth planning also incurs a massive time cost. If you choose to forgo expert guidance, you may invest hours into research, implementation, and still lack validation. Constructing a well organized financial plan and executing with the right products is not as easy as it may sound. Lets use the example of painting a house. With some time, you could learn how to do it yourself, familiarize yourself with the techniques, and purchase the necessary equipment. Then the huge allotment of time to actually paint it. The time value of financial advisors is similar. A great advisor becomes your household CFO, which allows you to focus on doing what generated your success in the first place, as well as free up time to spend with loved ones.

Hitting The Gym

We all have busy lives. We are pulled in a million different directions all day, every day. Hiring an advisor will not only help you feel less stretched (and stressed) but it can actually increase your wealth, and allow you to achieve your goals. Having a Personal Wealth Trainer can allow you to live the life you want.