Any recommendations of financial planners in Canberra?

I would avoid Finanial Integrity for share advice.

I rememeber being told by one of their staff that roughly September 2008 would be a perfect time to invest in Rio Tinto (on margin!) or buy my own home, because both were about to take off in a big way.

Try Barnett, Lilley & Associates out in Hall.

boomacat said :

PS – the thing about HECS is, where else are you going to get an essentially interest free loan? Given that HECS is simply bundled into your tax, do you really miss the money you pay back every fortnight? I prefer to invest the extra money for a good return rather than pay back HECS (although the premium you get for paying lump sums is, I admit, attractive).

Forget about the interest-free thing!

The point is that, in paying HECS back fortnightly, you are paying 10% more than you have to. Saving 10% is the same as earning 10% in investments! (Except that to earn 10% after tax, you would need an investment return more like 15-16%).

No current investment exists that gives you a guaranteed 10% return on your money like repaying HECS does.

123qwe said :

I will be chipping in 20 of the 40 million I won in Nigeria…

You won too? Wow, what are the odds?

.

I have a mate who has free-range ostriches running around on his olive grove. He says he could turn a 500% profit in three years.

I will be chipping in 20 of the 40 million I won in Nigeria tonight on the ostiches. The rest into the olives. See you in corporate boxes Charchar…….

I agree

“A friend of mine has a theory, if a financial planner knows what he’s talking about, he wouldn’t be working for a living.”

maybe I am the friend…

The other scam to look at is the Super co contribution.
If I remember correctly it is a case of put in $1000 and the gov kicks in $1500.
read about it here and not at some thieving financial planners website:
http://www.ato.gov.au/individuals/content.asp?doc=/Content/42616.htm

But super funds are a shite investment right now unless they have a cash option.

And remember if the returns are too good to be true, its a “Storm” or “Madoff” or “a pair of loud speakers in the back of a white van” but that’s another story …

PS – the thing about HECS is, where else are you going to get an essentially interest free loan? Given that HECS is simply bundled into your tax, do you really miss the money you pay back every fortnight? I prefer to invest the extra money for a good return rather than pay back HECS (although the premium you get for paying lump sums is, I admit, attractive).

PS – I worked in financial services in a legal capacity, aint a planner and am not technically skilled at all and am just giving my own know it all riot acter opinion, so you know feel free to ignore me.

I worked in the financial services industry for many years. My opinion is that most financial planners are totally CRAP and are only interested in flogging you whatever shite product they will get the most commission off.

However, there are a few exceptional candidates around. A great financial planner will help you do better than you could on your own, despite the number of books you purchase.

Try ipac financial planning http://www.ipac.com.au, I’m pretty sure they’re associated with planners in the ACT. There was an ASIC/Choice shadow shopper survey a few years back, and they came up trumps (whereas most mobs, including a few accounting aligned firms, did woefully).

toriness said :

if you pay off bulk amounts (more than $500 in one go?) of your HECs you get a substantial discount – 10%. i am not an accountant but this is surely a better ‘rate of return’ on most other investments?

Quite correct. For every $1000 you repay, the government scrubs off $1100 of your HECS debt. I’m also no accountant, but that looks to me like a 10% return on your money.

Why would you bother with an online savings account paying 5% (taxable) interest at best when you’ve got a guaranteed, tax-free 10% staring you in the face?

if you pay off bulk amounts (more than $500 in one go?) of your HECs you get a substantial discount – 10%. i am not an accountant but this is surely a better ‘rate of return’ on most other investments?

Americanberran said :

I thought Evil was gunna type: Avoid the firm..Dewey, Cheatham & Howe.

haha i thought that was a law firm??

Just make sure you separate your financial planning advice from purchasing any financial products ie pay the planner for the advice only(you could pay up to $1500) & mak it clear to them you are paying for financial advice & that is all.

A medium size accounting firm or Industry Super people would be a good place to start.

There’s quite a few independant financial advisors around, they charge *you* like any other professional. A bloke that sometimes writes in the CT, Wayne Lear, gave me some sensible advice a few years back, and I’ve since found out that other people I know have used him and have positive opinions also. stick him in google, or just use the email link in his column in the CT (if he still writes in that).

I thought Evil was gunna type: Avoid the firm..Dewey, Cheatham & Howe.

Avoid a bloke named Wayne Swan.

Most financial planners worth their salt should be able to give you advice on your HECS position and a whole heap more general advice as well. You could try Malcolm Wybrow at Wybrow and associates on 6162 4100.

As for accountant i think you should find one you can trust, offers proactive advice (which also goes for fin planners i reckon, after all why go to one if you already knew what you were doing), and has a speciality in what you are interested in, ie property/business etc. I like Robert Johnson at Hardwickes, its a firm that has been around for 50 odd years so has lots of experience. they’re on 6282 5999

I’ve been to see Industry Fund Financial Planning and they were great. They’re those ones with two people in the add’s and ones going up and the other is going down. They are 100% fee-for-service (no commissions). They specialise in Superannuation, but can also help with any general planning needs. It was great because the first appointment was free to gain some general information and then they gave me a quote for my retirement plan.
Just read recently too that they were recommended by an independent report (Rice Warner I think – was in the Sydney Morning Herald).

You don’t need to educate yourself to the standard of being a financial planner, just learning how to save money each pay, and the choices you have in how you make your savings work for you is a decent start.

At the very least you need to know enough to detect if you’re being screwed over, unlike the people who lost everything in the Storm fiasco.

Self education plus a friend who was doing what I wanted to do and was willing to give me a list of books to read on the subject worked well for me.

A friend of mine has a theory, if a financial planner knows what he’s talking about, he wouldn’t be working for a living.

There are people who make a living out of being up to date and knowledgeable about these matters. I don’t have the sort of time I’d need to invest to get even close to the level of competence I’d expect from an accountant or financial advisor. Happy to pay for their services instead!

Go to one of the public libraries and browse through the books available on finance, investing etc. There’s nothing like educating yourself enough to be able to decide what would suit you best.

So any recommendations for a good accountant who might be able to help out with this as well?

Stay away from Civic Financial Planning – all they do is steer you toward their preferred products, from which they get the greatest return. You might be the client, but all their advice is geared to their profits.

Tronno is right about having to declare kickbacks – however, that only applies to “hard” commissions, not the “soft” ones. The product providers are very adept at structuring products to increase non-declared soft commissions, and financial plannerrs like Civic are very adept at making the most of these.

Whichever way, you’re screwed. Find a commission-only advisor, who will genuinely act on your behalf. There might be one, but they’re almost impossible to find. All seem to have tie-ins of some sort. Have a look at this huge thread on Yahoo: http://au.messages.yahoo.com/finance/finance_news/5809?p=2

My bad it is indexed with the CPI, see below.

HELP(HECS) indexation rates ATO:
2006 – 2.8%
2007 – 3.4%
2008 – 2.8%
RBA Year Ended (June) Percentage Change inflation rates RBA:
2006 – 4.0%
2007 – 2.1%
2008 – 4.5%

Financial planners are required to disclose if they are getting a kickback on anything they recommend to you.

I’d recommend going with a smaller CPA or CA firm

If you haven’t bought a house, get a home loan savers account, and the Gov will top you 17% of whatever you put in up to 70k !

Put it ALL in there.

Pay minimum off HECS.

G-Fresh said :

As for the HECS better to only make minimum payments as it is essentially an interest free loan – indexed with inflation.

I dunno about this. For some reason, I think that the indexation method they use outstrips actual inflation pretty drastically.

I could be wrong. I’ve always been crap with cash.

As for the HECS better to only make minimum payments as it is essentially an interest free loan – indexed with inflation.

Another $0.02 – your longer term investment strategy will depend, to a degree, on the Henry Review of the Australian tax system.

Sock your cash into term deposits, etc until an outcome is known.

A good accountant will provide you with the sort of advice you’re looking for.

Financial planners will, as a rule, be trying to flog you a range of managed investments – they’ll offer you just enough advice with respect to savings and getting your financial poo together so that you can afford to buy into whatever they’re flogging.

Which seems like an appropriate segue to an accountant joke:
Q. How can you spot an extroverted accountant?
A. They look at YOUR shoes when talking to you.

No real recommendations, but if I may offer my $0.02:

Basically your HECS debt is the cheapest loan you will ever get. I am not 100% sure, but I think any extra payments you make onto your HECS can not be redrawn, meaning you should be very sure you do dont want to use the money for anything else in the next 5 years or so before paying it to HECS.

If you are planning on investing/travelling/buying a house/whatever in the next few years, you would be better off (at a minimum) putting the savings into an online savings account, as even the interest you receive on that should be more than the interest you would save on your HECS. You could also look at term deposits or bonds for a better rate if you dont need the money for a while.

For a more aggressive approach, I would park the money in an online account until later in the year, and then look at getting into some solid shares when the market starts going up again.

Managed funds could also be a good option to take advantage of the likely rebound without the need do all the research, buying shares, etc yourself. This would be particularly good as it sounds like you will have regular savings to go in, and can have a savings plan set up that it purchases a certain $ amount of units in the fund each month. This can not be done as easily with direct share investment.

Financial planners are usually just retailers of products developed elsewhere. The kind of budgeting advice you are looking for is best obtained from somewhere like lifeline.