This is Not a Fling : Why Your Financial Advisor Should Know Your Family for Generations

What is Happiness in Retirement?

The happiness in retirement podcast is a holistic financial planning show that teaches you how to maximize your wealth and your happiness, and its for anyone who wants to squeeze all the juice out of their life - and their money.

Welcome to the Happiness in Retirement podcast, where

we help you turn your retirement dreams into reality. Each

week, we'll dive into smart financial strategies, lifestyle

tips, and expert insights to help you build a fulfilling and

secure retirement. Whether you're planning ahead or

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best years. Del

Sette Capital Management, LLC. Del Sette is

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offered to clients or prospective clients where Del Sette and its

representatives are properly licensed or exempt from licensure. For

additional information, please visit our website at www.happinessinretirement.com.

Hello, and welcome to this episode of the Happiness in

Retirement podcast, because the road to retirement

should be an adventure, not a survival strategy.

Thank you for joining me today. I'm your host, Bill Del-Sette. Let's get

right into it. You know, there are some relationships in life

that are temporary. You may drive the same car for five or

six years. You may live in a house for a decade and then move.

You may have a favorite restaurant, a favorite vacation spot,

maybe even a favorite routine, but it can come and go over

time. I believe, humbly, that your relationship with

a financial advisor should be different. It's not a

fling, and here's why. When you choose the right

financial advisor, you're potentially choosing someone who will

walk beside you and your family for decades. And

ideally, that relationship doesn't end with you. You

see, it can continue with your spouse, it continues with

your children, and maybe someday it even continues with

your grandchildren. It should be multi-generational. You

see, it should be about understanding a family. How do

you put a price tag on being known? So think

about what happens when you've worked with someone for 20 or 30 years.

Your advisor doesn't simply know how much money you have. They

know the story behind the money. They remember when you were

building your career and wondering whether you could afford to buy your first home.

They remember when your children were young and college seemed

a long way away. I have many stories about the

kids of our current clients at Del Sette Capital, and

for many years I actually had a coloring on my

refrigerator made with crayons of my car.

parked in their driveway, and those kids today are now

adults. They remember when you were trying to decide whether to

start a business, sell a business, retire, or work a little

longer. They remember the market downturns when you were nervous. They

remember the opportunities you were excited about. And then remember

the mistakes you made, and hopefully they helped you avoid a

few mistakes as well. You see, over time,

an advisor learns something that no financial statement can

completely capture. They learn you. They

understand your relationship with money. the psychology of

money that you may have. They understand what makes you

nervous. They understand what gives you confidence. And they certainly know

your goals and dreams and desires. They understand the difference between

what you say is important and what your decisions reveal is

actually important to you. And that knowledge, friends, is

enormously valuable. And just like money, it

can compound. You see, we talk a lot in

financial planning about compound interest. Money earns money,

and that money earns more money. And over decades, something that started

relatively small can become very significant. And

I think relationships work the same way. You see, every

conversation adds another layer. Every decision

adds another piece of information. Every market cycle

adds perspective, every major life transition adds

history to the file. And eventually, your advisor

doesn't have to start from scratch every time you walk into the

office. They understand the context, how important is

that, the context of your life. They know why certain decisions

were made or not made. They know what matters to you, your

relationship with your children and grandchildren. They

understand the trade-offs you've made along the way. And

that, friends, is very different from meeting someone for the first time

and handing them a stack of statements. Now, consider

that your financial life is like a movie, okay? When

a new advisor first meets a family, they're seeing a snapshot in

time. They're seeing the picture. Here's the portfolio. Here's the

tax return. Here's the estate plan, here's the insurance,

here's the house, here's the business, here's the retirement account. But

those documents certainly don't tell the story of your

life. A long-term advisor has watched the

movie. They understand how you got here. And often, how

you got here is essential to understanding where you should go next. Maybe

you grew up in a family where money was always tight. That may

explain why having a large amount of cash makes you feel safe. Maybe

you watched your parents struggle financially in retirement. That

may explain why running out of money is one of your greatest fears. Maybe

you started a business from scratch and took enormous risks to build

your wealth. That may affect the way you think about investing. These

are not numbers, they are experiences. They're

emotions, they're values. And good financial planning

needs to understand your experiences, your

emotions, and your values. The relationship should

evolve with your life. So, think of it this way.

The financial planning you need at 35 shouldn't look exactly like

the planning you need at 55. and the plenty you need at 75 should

be different again. Early in life, much of the focus may

be on building. You're earning money, you're saving, you're investing, protecting

your income, buying insurance to protect that income, raising

children, funding college, maybe buying a home, starting

a business. You're building your financial foundation. Then

something begins to change. Now think about this. The

focus starts moving from accumulating money to creating

financial independence. You begin asking different questions.

When can I stop working? How much money is enough? What kind

of lifestyle can I afford? What would retirement actually look

like for me? Eventually you cross another line. Now

you're no longer simply accumulating money. You're using the money

you've spent decades building and once again the questions change. How

much can I spend? Where should the money come from? How should

I invest now? When should I claim social security? Should

I convert money to a Roth IRA? How should I manage taxes?

How do I protect my spouse? That's a big one. How do I prepare

for possible long-term care expenses? And what

do I want to give my children? What experiences do I want while

I'm still healthy enough to enjoy them? And ultimately, what

do I want all of this money to accomplish? You see, a

long-term financial advisor has the opportunity to help

you navigate every one of these transitions because

retirement is not the finish line. And one

of the biggest misconceptions about financial planning is that retirement

is the destination. We spend 30 or 40 years preparing for

retirement as though we're approaching some financial finish line. But

retirement could last another 25, 30, or maybe even 40 years

with all the medical advances these days. So retirement isn't

really the finish line, it's transition. And in

many ways, it's where some of the most interesting financial planning begins.

During your working year, success is often relatively

easy to measure. Did we save enough? Did the portfolio grow?

Did our income increase? Did our net worth increase? Retirement?

is totally different. Now we're trying to convert financial success into

life success. The questions become less about accumulation and

more about meaning. What do I want my days to look like? Where

do I want to live? Who do I want to spend time with? What do

I want to experience? What am I still curious about?

Boy, that's a great question. What gives my life purpose

ultimately? And how can my money help me do more of those

things? A financial advisor who has known you for many years is in a position

to help you answer those questions, especially those of us

that are registered life planners, but that's the topic of a

different podcast. Then the family answers the

picture. At some point something else happens. Your financial plan

stops being only about you. Your children grow

up, they begin careers, they get married. They buy homes.

They have children of their own. Maybe they're starting businesses. Maybe

they're trying to figure out how much house they can afford. Maybe

they're deciding how much to contribute to a 401k. Maybe

they're wondering whether they should buy life insurance. And maybe

they're beginning to inherit some of the financial responsibility that

you've carried for decades and help them to understand. And

suddenly, Financial planning is now multi-generational.

This is where an advisor can become far more than the person managing

mom and dad's investment portfolio. You see, they

can become a financial resource for the family.

Your children shouldn't meet your financial advisor at your

funeral. and I've always thought this is one of the most important ideas

in multi-generational financial planning. They shouldn't meet

your financial advisor only after you're gone. Now, think

about the situation here, right? Mom or dad passes away,

the family is grieving, there are investments, retirement accounts,

insurance, real estate, estate planning documents, maybe

trusts, maybe business interests, maybe tax

issues, and in the middle of all that, someone hands the

children the business card of a person they've never met. Now

compare that with a family where the next generation already

knows the advisor and his or her team. They've met,

they've sat in meetings, they know where to call, they

know who understands the plan, the advisor understands the

family dynamics and the family relationship. So important, folks,

they understand the estate plan, Maybe they helped in the creation

of it, working with your attorney. They understand why certain decisions

were made. They understand what mom and dad wanted the money to

accomplish. That's a completely different experience. Maybe they've

had more than one family meeting at their office to

discuss these issues. Generational planning should

begin before the wealth transfers. People

often think estate planning is something that happens at death, but

the best generational planning happens while everyone is still sitting

around the table. It involves conversations, it involves education,

it involves preparing people, it's not just

numbers. Because eventually your children may inherit not just money,

but responsibility and the values that

you have instilled in them. And those aren't the same thing. Someone

can inherit a million dollars and have absolutely no idea what to

do with it. Someone can inherit a business and have no idea why

it was structured the way it was. Someone can inherit a trust and

not understand their parents' intentions. A

financial advisory relationship can help prepare the

next generation before that transition occurs.

You see, money comes with a story. Every family with wealth

has one. Maybe the wealth came from a business or it came from

decades of saving and hard work. Maybe someone worked two jobs

and the generation before them worked three. Maybe grandparents immigrated

with very little. Maybe a family lived below its means for

40 years. Maybe someone took enormous entrepreneurial risk.

And maybe and probably. There were

failures along the way. And eventually future generations may

see only the result. They see the investment accounts, they

see the house, they see the business, they see the inheritance, but

they may not understand what went into creating it. And I

think one of the most valuable things a multi-generational financial

planning relationship can preserve is that the story

behind the money, because the story contains Values,

the things that matter to you. Hard work, discipline, patience,

risk-taking, generosity, education, family, independence.

Those values may ultimately be far more important than

the account balances. You see, Wealth without context

is just money. Imagine you're sitting on a plane about

to take off and the stewardess gets up in front of everyone and

starts talking about how to use the oxygen and

what to do in the event of a crash. Now, do you really listen? Probably

not. If you're like most people, you're just gonna go on and maybe look

at your phone or do whatever it is you're doing. But instead,

imagine that the pilot comes on the

loudspeaker when you're in the air and says, folks, I

think we're going to crash. Listen to how to use the

safety equipment on the plane. I think you're going to listen. Same

conversation, different context. You see, Wealth needs

to have context. Otherwise, it's just money. It's just money.

If you give the next generation money without context, you're just

transferring assets. But if you transfer money along with the values

that matter to you, and you transfer knowledge and preparation,

you're transferring something much bigger. You are transferring stewardship.

You're saying, this is what our family built. This is how we

built it. This is what we believed was important and

this is what we hope this money would make possible for you.

Maybe to help us educate grandchildren, maybe to allow someone

to start a business that provides security, maybe it supports a

charity, maybe it creates experiences for the family, and maybe

it simply gives future generations the freedom to make choices. that

previous generations could not make. Money can

do wonderful things, but somebody has to help a family think intentionally

about what that money is for, and your advisor can

become the family's financial historian. Interesting

concept. There's another role a long-term financial advisor can

play, and I think this role is significantly underestimated.

Families forget things, people die, memories fade. Children

may not know why mom and dad made certain decisions. But

an advisor who's been involved for decades may and probably will

remember. What was the trust created for? Why

was that insurance policy purchased? Why did dad keep

that piece of property? Why was one child given part of the business while

another received different assets? Why was a certain charity

important to mom and dad? That knowledge can provide valuable

continuity and the advisor isn't replacing the

family, they're helping preserve the financial context. surrounding

the family decisions. So important to pass on those family

values. Now, here's the thing. The advisory firm has

a responsibility too. If we're asking families to

think generationally, financial advisory firms need

to think generationally too. Because guess what, folks? Advisors

get older. I know, hard to believe. Advisors get older

too. Advisors retire. And someday, the

person who originally built the relationship may not be the person sitting

across the table. Hard to believe, I know. So an advisory firm

that wants to serve families for generations better be building something

bigger than any one individual. It needs a team. It

needs systems, and it needs a succession. It

needs younger advisors who understand the firm's philosophy and

the family it serves, and it needs to believe in that philosophy,

and it needs to care as much as the original founding advisor. It

needs institutional memory, because the goal shouldn't

simply be for one advisor to have a 30-year relationship with a client. The

goal should be for a family to have a 50, 60, or

even a 100-year relationship with an advisory organization

capable of serving generation after generation.

You see, it goes from client relationship to family relationship both

ways. That changes the way we should think about financial advice, doesn't

it? And instead of asking who manages my investment account, The

better question is, who understands my family's financial life? Who

understands my family dynamics? Who understands my family values?

Who understands where we've been? Where we're trying to

go? And who understands our children? Who understands the

decisions we've already made and why they were made? And

who will still be there when the next generation needs help? That,

my friends, is a very different relationship. You

see, this is not a fling. It's so important when

you choose a financial advisor to think like this. When

you think about financial advice this way, the relationship begins to

look very different. It's not about constantly shopping around for

the hottest investment idea. In fact, if you start shopping

around for an advisor every time his or her financial strategy

underperforms or doesn't perform well, then you're

gonna be in for a heap of trouble, in my opinion. It's

not about jumping from strategy to strategy. When

you work with an advisor, you're buying into their philosophy

and approach. And it's certainly not about chasing whoever had

the best performance last year. A great advisory relationship

is built over the course of years. Conversation by

conversation, decision by decision. Can't tell

you how many kitchen tables I've sat around late at night in

my career, driving home in snowstorms, driving around

in my beat up old car when I first got my start to meet with people.

Market cycle by market cycle. So important, life

transition by life transition, and eventually the relationship

contains something incredibly valuable, a history. And

a history creates understanding, and it can create trust.

And trust makes better conversations possible. You

see, the real goal, in my humble opinion, is not

simply to accumulate the biggest possible pile of money.

Of course not, right? The goal is to use the money to build a

life you love and to use that money for happiness

and retirement, whatever that may mean for you. And if there's money

left over to thoughtfully pass that opportunity to the people and causes you

care about. An advisor can connect those two things, your

financial resources and your family's values. And

when that relationship works the way it should, it can become something

that lasts far beyond a single retirement. It

can last through careers, retirements, marriages, divorces,

children, grandchildren, inheritance, and through many

generations. When you're choosing a financial advisor,

remember what you're really choosing. Don't jump around from advisor

to advisor unless you have a compelling reason to leave,

and certainly you might. But you're not simply choosing someone to manage

an account. You're choosing someone who may become part of your family's

financial life. for decades, maybe even friends, huh?

I am blessed and lucky to work in this kind of

business and to have built relationships with people over

decades. I've been to weddings, funerals, birthdays. I've

sat around the table in some incredibly important meetings.

And in many cases, I know more about my clients than just

about anyone. And that is incredibly important for

me to understand the context of how they make decisions. And we

know our clients' children in most cases. And

we understand not only what you own, but why you built it. So

important. It's not supposed to be a short-term relationship. It's

not a fling. It's a relationship built around your family's financial

goals and financial life. And when it's done well, it can

last for generations. I'm Bill Del Setti, and this is

the Happiness in Retirement Podcast. Thanks for listening, and

until next time, remember this, folks, don't just build wealth,

build the knowledge, relationships, and values with a financial advisory

team that can help the next generation, maybe even

the one after that, use it well. Talk to you soon. Bye-bye.

That's it for today's episode of the Happiness in Retirement Program

podcast. We hope you found some valuable insights to

help you create the retirement you deserve. If you enjoyed this

episode, be sure to subscribe, leave a review, and

share it with someone who's planning for their future. For more tips and

resources, visit happinessinretirement.com or

the Del Sette Capital Management Facebook page. Until next

time, here's to a happy, healthy, and financially secure