Plan → Implement → Review → Repeat
In our opinion, the most successful investment advisory relationships begin with clear communication between the client and the advisor. The client communicates their goals and preferences including attitude toward risk. Specifically, we think of a client as expecting a stream of cash flows which includes current investments and future contributions and withdrawals including retirement, educational planning, trusts, gifting and estate planning.
Our task is to understand the broad opportunities in the markets – long term expected returns and risks from stocks and bonds. Our first task is to help the client appreciate the likelihood of their achieving their goals based on our expectations about the long-term return and risk of cash, bonds and stocks. A plan states the goals, permissible investments, maximum and minimum allocations, and any benchmarks which might be used for performance comparisons.
We implement using low expense mutual funds and exchange traded funds sponsored by firms including but not limited to Black Rock, Dimensional Fund Advisors, Powershares, Schwab, State Street, and Vanguard. For some clients the purchase of individual municipal bonds may make sense. We monitor markets on a continual basis. We provide reports at least quarterly and are available for discussions any time. We use discussions to review possible reasons to modify the investment plan.