As some of you know, I moved to Westport, CT over a year ago. I still work in NYC twice a week, present personal finance and retirement seminars in NYC and teach classes at places like Freelancers Union and Barnard Athena Center for Leadership. Randye Kaplan, my esteemed colleague has also been working with me in NYC seeing clients for over five years! Both of us also work with clients via skype and on the phone (all over the country, even China!).
My request to you is if you know anyone in Southeastern CT that would like to work with an INDEPENDENT financial planner/educator/coach, please forward my information. Also, if you know any groups that need a Personal Finance Expert Speaker in CT or NYC, please let me know. On to today's article about ....
How to Make your Financial Worries Go Away
I recently met with Barbara, a spry personable woman close to retirement age. The worry from money fears and being a bag lady was apparent from the minute she sat down. Immediately she launched into a monologue of never retiring, not understanding her money and no clue where her investments were. This was even more acute as retirement for a single lady as herself.
I assured her she would leave our session feeling more at ease and at peace with her finances. While I could see she didn't believe me- we moved on. Our steps we took together:
1) Side by side we wrote a list of all her assets.Since she had IRAs, 401ks and pensions at 6 different firms, she couldn't see the big picture. We made a decision to transfer and consolidate everything to Fidelity. While they have a great website, she also liked their brick and mortar offices.
2) We FOUND money in a pension. This is not typical of many of my clients but she had worked years ago for a corporation that offered a pension as a benefit. I coached her on what questions to ask regarding how to get the info from the Benefits department. She needed to find out what her monthly income would be. It amounted to THOUSANDS of dollars monthly!
These are just a few steps we took together. When she left, Barbara looked 10 years younger, had an action plan she tackled immediately and more importantly stopped worrying so much about her finances and future. If you want to make your financial worries go away like Barbara, give us a call for your Independent Financial Checkup!