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By Kevin Speake, head of advice at Quilter Cheviot International
WE here in Jersey have all recently experienced first-hand how an unexpected event can have a devasting impact on us and those around us.
So, how prepared are you for those financial events that you know are coming around the corner and those that may simply take you by surprise?
When each of us embarks on our financial journey, there are many life events we will encounter that will change our financial landscape for better or worse. However, knowing exactly when these events will occur and what impact they will have on us from a financial, emotional or wellbeing perspective is often the real challenge.
Therefore, the benefits of being properly prepared for all potential financial scenarios by planning ahead shouldn’t be underestimated or overlooked.
Having a structured financial plan, tailored to you and your specific financial aspirations by a professional financial planner, will give you and your family some measurable goals to work towards and the assurance you have contingency in place for the unexpected.
Whenever you create any plan and accomplish it, you feel a sense of achievement and satisfaction. Planning will help you to be able to impose personal control and ownership in achieving your financial peace of mind. Because you can now track your progress, you can reduce any doubt or uncertainty regarding your decisions, as they are now made from an informed position.
Reviewing your plan with the help of your professional financial planner, and making regular adjustments, will keep you on track and help overcome any obstacles that could have previously derailed you.
I am regularly told by clients that the main reason they don’t put plans in place is due to a lack of time. But what are the consequences of this and are these too important to ignore?
The future that comes to fruition does not just happen; it is achieved by us making conscious decisions now.
WHAT IS FINANCIAL PLANNING?
Financial planning is the process that helps individuals, families and businesses to organise their financial affairs, maximising the resources to achieve the lifestyle and financial objectives in the short, medium and long term.
A financial plan will help you make the most of your money, such as sending your children to university, buying a bigger home, leaving a legacy, or enjoying a comfortable retirement, perhaps earlier than you had originally thought possible.
Having a financial plan will also allow you to align your investment strategy to your plan’s specific requirements, it will identify the returns you personally need to achieve and the risk you will need to take to achieve this. Therefore, your portfolio will become individually tailored to your requirements.
THE BENEFITS OF FINANCIAL PLANNING ARE:
- You will become financially organised.
- You will be financially prepared and protected.
- You will experience smoother life-stage transitions.
- You will have sight of your goals and will be working towards achieving them.
- You will have an individually tailored investment strategy.
- You will achieve financial peace of mind.
THE POWER OF CASHFLOW
Cashflow modelling is a powerful tool that sits at the heart of any leading financial planning process. By producing a visual display of a client’s cashflow scenario, both now and into the future, it can:
Help to identify any potential surplus or shortfall in current income vs expenditure.
- Determine the pre-retirement commitments you need to make to achieve your desired retirement date.
- Demonstrate the impact of your planned lifestyle events and the associated expenditure.
- Demonstrate the wider impact of unplanned events and how to protect against them.
- Highlight how some minor changes have the potential to dramatically change your financial future.
- Show whether you will have enough money to retire on, when you plan to or before.
- Show whether you could achieve your desired lifestyle in retirement;
- Plan a number of ‘what if’ scenarios and illustrate how they would impact your goals.
- Calculate the investment returns you specifically require in achieving your plan.
- Determine and control the risks you need to take during your financial journey.
- Identify the point at which you can achieve personal financial freedom.
Remember the Benjamin Franklin quote: “If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail.”’ Experience shows that there is definitely some truth in that.
Our qualified team of professional financial planners is committed to helping you build wealth across your working lifetime to enjoy later in life, and pass on to loved ones.
Our financial planners will create a trusted environment where the client is the only person who benefits from their recommendations. At Quilter Cheviot we do not charge our clients for implementing any solutions we recommend.
Don’t delay. Take the first step towards your financial future with a complimentary initial consultation to understand whether our financial planning team can assist you.
Contact Gillian.schweppe@quiltercheviot.com to arrange your appointment.
This material is not tax, legal or accounting advice and should not be relied on for tax, legal or accounting purposes. Quilter Cheviot Limited does not provide tax, legal or accounting advice. You should consult your own tax, legal and accounting adviser(s) before engaging in any transaction.
Quilter Cheviot and Quilter Cheviot Investment Management are trading names of Quilter Cheviot International Limited. Quilter Cheviot International Limited is regulated by the Jersey Financial Services Commission.
