The Surprising Ways a Financial Planner Can Help

You probably already know that a financial planner can help you with money matters. They can help you to increase your savings, to make some smart investments, to get rid of debt, and just to get to a better place financially. It might surprise you to learn, however, that these experts can also help you

with a lot of other things in the process. Read on to learn about some of the surprising, positive effects that hiring a financial planner can have.  

 

An Improved Marriage

Did you know that financial stress is one of the leading causes for failed marriages? In fact, in a recent study on relationship stress conducted by SunTrust, 35% of people in strained relationships listed finances as the main problem in their relationship.

The fact of the matter is that, no matter how much you love your partner, if you’re struggling to stay afloat and disagree on how to spend money, you’re probably going to have a lot of stress and get into more than your fair share of related fights.

When you hire a financial planner, it’s like hiring a mediator to help you and your partner discuss your finances openly and honestly. Together, you can figure out what’s causing your financial problems and what you can do to remedy them. Talking through your problems and then coming up with and working through a plan to make things better can bring you closer together and improve your marriage and your communication big time.

A Better-Functioning Family

Another thing that financial planners can help you with is developing a will and finding guaranteed ways to leave your money and other assets to your loved ones when you pass on. When you work with a financial planner to develop a clear and clearly detailed strategy for where your money will go after you pass on, you’re not only taking care of their financial needs; you may just be helping to smooth over potential fights or disagreements as well.

All too often, after the death of a loved one, family members find themselves turning on each other and squabbling over “who gets what.” When you’ve worked with a financial planner and made plans ahead of time, there is no arguing; the allocations have already been put in place, allowing your family to go on functioning happily and argument-free even after you’re gone.

Reduce Personal Stress

Finally, financial planners can help you to get rid of some of the stress and worry in your own life. If you don’t have a good financial plan in place, you probably worry a lot about the future, about saving for retirement, and even just about making ends meet. That can cause a lot of anxiety and unhappiness, which are the last things you want in your life, but when you work to create a doable financial plan with your financial planner, you strip away the stress and worry for good and can get on with just living and enjoying your life.

Financial planners do more than just help you get your finances in order; they help you to improve your life in multiple ways, and that alone makes them worth using.

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How to Get Ready for a Mortgage Refinance

There’s never been a better time than the present to refinance your mortgage loan. Right now, mortgage rates are low, and refinancing could mean taking points off your current rate or lengthening or increasing the term of your mortgage to work better for you. There are tons of benefits to refinancing, talk them over with your financial planning professional, and continue to read on below.

If you are considering mortgage refinancing at this time, though, there are a few tips you’ll want to keep in mind as you prepare to make this helpful change.   

Tip #1: Get Everything Together

First things first, prepare yourself to deal with a lot of documents and paperwork. That probably doesn’t sound very fun, but, unfortunately, it’s part of the refinancing process. The good news is that you can make the whole process easier on yourself if you go ahead and gather up everything you’re gong to need ahead of time. This will typically include:

l  Proof of income in the form of pay stubs from the last 6 pay periods   

l  Copies of your tax return from the last two years

l  Receipts or canceled checks from child support or alimony payments

l  Proof of any assets owned

Having this information on hand and ready to go will allow everything to be processed more quickly and easily so that you can get your refinancing done and start benefiting from it!

Tip #2: Know Your Home’s Value

You’ll also need to go ahead and get your home appraised before you embark on the refinancing process. Not only is your bank going to need to know your home’s value in order to determine how much you can borrow, but you’ll also need to have enough value in your home for it to qualify for refinancing.

 Even if it doesn’t qualify, it’s better to know that ahead of time, before you’ve done lots of work toward attempting to get your home refinanced.

Tip #3: Get Your Credit in Check

Finally, before you make a go at mortgage refinancing, make sure you know where you stand in terms of your credit score. You can view your credit for free online from one of the three federal reporting agencies.

If you find that your credit score is very low, you probably won’t qualify for refinancing. What you can do, however, is work to improve your credit so that you will qualify. Again, though, as is the case with your home’s value, it’s better to know the truth ahead of time so that you can make necessary changes or find another option before you get too far along in the refinancing process.

As you can see, refinancing does take some work and preparation on your part. However, doing that work ahead of time will benefit you in the long-run and will enable your mortgage refinancing to go as smoothly and easily as possible for all involved.

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Wise Ways to Use a Windfall

Most of us dream about money just, one day, falling into our laps. And, while for most people, the dream remains just that- a dream, it does sometimes happen to the lucky few among us. If you happen to get a nice little windfall of cash, whether it be $1000 or $10,000, why not do something smart with it, something that can turn that little windfall into a potentially permanent cash flow!

Take Advantage of Company Match Policies

Employers, in an effort to encourage their employees to save for retirement, will often agree to match investments made into retirement funds. If your employer offers this option, you could, quite literally, double your money. Sure, you might not see the money until much later in life, but it’s money you weren’t expecting to have anyway, so why not?

Invest in the Stock Market   

Even if you’re not someone who regularly plays the stock market, you have nothing to lose by investing your “free money” into it. Don’t just make an investment choice at random however. If you don’t know much about the market, request the help of a financial advisor. For a small fee, they can typically give you a rundown on which stocks are the best bet right now, enabling you to make the most informed decision possible about what to do with your money.

Pay Toward a Stubborn Debt

Do you, like so many other people, have that one bill that never seems to get paid? Maybe it’s the credit card bill that has to take last priority over the other expenses in your life, or maybe it’s that old student loan debt. Whatever the case may be, if you have some stubborn debt in your life that never seems to get paid, a little unexpected cash is the perfect thing to put toward it. If you’re lucky, you might even be able to pay it off completely!

As such, there are a lot of truly great things you can do with unexpected money. Instead of wasting it all on a shopping spree or a quick vacation, do something lasting and positive with that money. You’ll thank yourself big time later.

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The Math of Money

Cover of The Math of Money

Financial planning can be defined as the evaluation and assessment of all the possible ways to invest your money, in order to reap the best benefits in the future. The main objective is to help you maximize your returns and minimize your losses. If you hire an experienced financial planner, you can change the way you lead your life as they will show you the best way to save and invest.

In order to properly plan your finances, a qualified financial adviser follows certain steps. First, they evaluate your monthly income, your expenses, your assets and then device a plan that best suits your lifestyle. If you follow the framework then you can maximize your income by cutting down unnecessary expenses and increasing your savings.

Setting Long term Goals

One of the key benefits of hiring an experienced financial professional is that they can help you set achievable long term goals. The process of achieving long-term goals is tough. Even if you begin saving for the future, chances are that you will miss some installments or stop saving for a few months. Your adviser will help you get back on track to minimize losses.

Expert Advice

As an average human being, you may not be well versed with the math of money. You may not understand the various policies and hidden terms. When you hire the services of an financial planner, they can give you their expert advice as well as offer you professional planning and analysis services.

Helping You out When the Market is Volatile

Investment markets and stock markets are highly volatile. No one really knows what the next market news will bring with itself. A competent adviser has a good understanding of the money markets, and can help you make the best decisions about your money. In addition, these professionals are always up to date with the latest information about the money markets.

These are just some of the key benefits of hiring financial advice. To get the best services, it is important that you consider factors such as experience, education, availability and commitment before you hire your financial planner.

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Your Guide to Getting Retirement Ready

According to the United States Department of Labor, fewer than half of all Americans are aware of how much they’ll need for retirement. When you consider that the average American spends as much as 20 years in retirement, that’s pretty scary.

Obviously, that’s where you need to start- by figuring out how much you will need to retire. Take your current living expenses and add a little extra for inflation and possible new expenses, such as medications. While you can come up with a fairly good “guesstimate” on your own, a retirement planning professional can help you with calculating a more accurate figure of how much you’d need for a comfortable retirement.

Either way, you’ll likely be surprised at the figure facing you, and that should provide plenty of motivation for you to spring into action and start saving. That- saving money- is really the first step toward preparing for retirement.

Non-Stagnant Saving

If you’re smart with your money, then you’re already putting a small percentage of your paycheck in your savings account each month. Word to the wise- if you’re not doing that, you should start!

The key, however, is not to get stagnant with your savings. Strive to increase the amount you save each month, even if it’s just by a dollar or two. Also, make sure you increase your savings amount each time you get a pay raise or come into extra money. Again, a retirement savings professional can be a vital tool for determining how much you should be saving and the progress you’re making toward your retirement savings goals.

Get on a Budget

The number of people who spend without a plan in mind is staggering. If you’re just spending your money as you wish and hoping against hope that everything evens out, then you’re not approaching spending correctly.

Work with a financial planner to develop a budget for each month. The budget should include how much you have to spend on bills, how much you have for “fun” purchases, and how much you are putting into savings accounts and other “future funds.” Then, stick to that budget!

The bottom line is that you have to see the big picture. When it comes to spending money, you can’t just approach a month as a month. It’s more than that- it’s a period of time during which you are inadvertently making decisions about your future. If you spend frivolously now, you’ll pay for it later, but if you budget your money and keep the big picture in mind, you’ll eventually reap the benefits.

Invest

While budgeting your money and making sure you put funds in your savings account each month is a good start, it’s simply not enough. You also need to be utilizing some type of investment strategy. Whether it’s a 401(k), a Roth IRA, or anything in between, you should be building some type of investment portfolio.

For best results, work with your financial advisor to find investment options that have low fees, taxes, and penalties. After all, you want your investments to work for, not against you.

If you can follow these basic tips, then there’s no reason you can’t enjoy a happy, comfortable retirement.

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