What Is Financial Planning?
A financial plan is a bridge that takes you from where you are currently in your financial life to where you wish to be.
A well-constructed financial plan starts, at the minimum, with an evaluation of the following: 1) What you own and owe; 2) What you earn, spend and invest each year; 3) What your goals and aspirations for the future are; 4) What your time frame for achieving those goals is; and 5) What your particular risk tolerances and concerns are and how they should be included in any future plan.
After gathering and analyzing this information, Garden Financial Planning develops specific recommendations that will help guide you towards your goals. A typical holistic financial plan might incorporate not only saving and investment recommendations, but also ideas regarding insurance coverage, estate planning, tax considerations, and other pertinent strategies germane to your life. The plan is customized to your life and your goals, and has the capability of being fluid when your life or goals change.
Once the plan is complete, you may implement it on your own, or you may employ Garden Financial Planning to assist you in certain aspects, such as investment portfolio design.
The plan should be reviewed periodically to ensure that it has been implemented properly, and to investigate whether changes in your life, the capital markets and economy, the tax environment, or other areas require the plan to be altered. Again, this monitoring can be done by you, or you may visit with us periodically to review the plan's effectiveness and whether changes are in order.
The objective of all this? To help you become knowledgeable about and gain mastery over your financial life, and to create both the vision of the life you want and the necessary tools to get you there.
A well-constructed financial plan starts, at the minimum, with an evaluation of the following: 1) What you own and owe; 2) What you earn, spend and invest each year; 3) What your goals and aspirations for the future are; 4) What your time frame for achieving those goals is; and 5) What your particular risk tolerances and concerns are and how they should be included in any future plan.
After gathering and analyzing this information, Garden Financial Planning develops specific recommendations that will help guide you towards your goals. A typical holistic financial plan might incorporate not only saving and investment recommendations, but also ideas regarding insurance coverage, estate planning, tax considerations, and other pertinent strategies germane to your life. The plan is customized to your life and your goals, and has the capability of being fluid when your life or goals change.
Once the plan is complete, you may implement it on your own, or you may employ Garden Financial Planning to assist you in certain aspects, such as investment portfolio design.
The plan should be reviewed periodically to ensure that it has been implemented properly, and to investigate whether changes in your life, the capital markets and economy, the tax environment, or other areas require the plan to be altered. Again, this monitoring can be done by you, or you may visit with us periodically to review the plan's effectiveness and whether changes are in order.
The objective of all this? To help you become knowledgeable about and gain mastery over your financial life, and to create both the vision of the life you want and the necessary tools to get you there.
What is Financial Planning?Limited (or Modular) Planning: Modular planning entails constructing a plan for only one or several parts of an otherwise holistic financial plan. Many people prefer to use modular planning, since it lets them address certain advice and planning needs as their life schedule demands. For example, a young couple might wish to create and implement an investment plan, utilizing their employers' qualified plans. This limited engagement is not a full-fledged financial plan, but an important piece of the whole. Consistently building the whole plan over time, in a series of modules, can be an efficient and cost-effective way to develop a holistic plan. Modular planning is billed by the hour ($200.00 per hour).
Holistic Financial Planning: A typical comprehensive financial plan will comprise most or all of traditional planning components, including income & expense analysis, investments, insurance coverages, estate planning concerns, tax considerations, and possibly education or special needs requirements. A holistic plan requires between 10-20 hours of work (depending on the number of planning modules involved and the complexity of the plan), costing between $2,000 and $4,000. |
What Do I Need to Provide?In order for Garden Financial Planning to create a plan, we'll need to gather specific information about your current financial life, including historical tax returns, current bank account and investment balances, retirement plan holdings, insurance coverage, and estate plans. We might want or need to speak with other professionals you currently employ (your CPA, for example) so that we obtain correct information and cooperate with any strategies you already may be using.
We will provide a checklist with all the items needed, and we will meet with you in person to discuss your goals, aspirations, risk concerns, time horizons, and other aspects of your financial life (both tangible and intangible) that are integral to creating an effective plan. |
How Do I Start?Give us a call to start the planning process! We will establish a no-obligation initial appointment to meet you, talk about your current financial situation, your goals and aspirations, your history with money and investments, and how we might help you with your plans. You'll also be able to ask us questions and make sure you are comfortable working with us.
Assuming you want to move forward, we'll ask you to first enter into an engagement agreement and we also will provide you with appropriate disclosures about Garrett Investment Advisors and about us. Subsequently, we'll ask you to forward the necessary current financial information to us, we'll establish a timeline for the planning process, and we will begin building your personalized financial plan to grow your financial future! |