Wealth Management: Charting a Course for Your Financial Future

Early in their marriage, Dan Griffith and his wife sat down to discuss their finances. Like most young couples, they knew they would need to start making plans for such things as paying for their children’s college tuition, buying a home and, eventually, retirement.

Unlike most young couples, however, the Griffiths had a certain advantage when it came to planning the family’s financial future. That’s because Dan is the director of wealth strategy at Huntington Private Bank. As part of his job, he educates clients and colleagues on planning techniques and leads a team of advisers dedicated to working with ultra-high net worth clients.

“My wife and I are [still] having these conversations,” says Griffith, who used to practice law. “We sit down every year. We’re no different from other clients.”

Their oldest child is going to college next year, so they’re plotting how much they will need to put into the “bucket” of cash designated for tuition. But they know to keep track of the retirement bucket, too. “Those are things we’re thinking [about],” Griffith says. “Other people might not be aware of them, but we’re lucky enough to know that different phases of life require different planning.”

Those kinds of discussions take place daily for Mike Foley, who leads PNC’s Asset Management Group in Columbus. “It all starts with a conversation with clients,” he says. “When that conversation works the best, it is a very transparent and honest conversation. What are their goals? What are they trying to accomplish in the short term—the next year or five years—and then long term?

“Whatever phase of life, whether they’re 25 or 65, if we’re doing it right, we can get to the ‘why’ behind this. Once we have that nailed down, articulated and understood, then we can focus on the particulars.”

To ensure that the conversation is transparent and honest, “the most important part is finding your adviser,” says Olivia Herzog, a financial planner at Hyre Personal Wealth Advisors. “Someone valuing you as a person, not just your money. It’s really important to find someone who cares about you. Someone you can really trust, someone you can relate to, who understands your unique experience.”

Once that relationship is established, talk about the dollars and cents can begin. The right financial planning partner can help clients plan for homeownership, college costs, retirement and all the little things in between.

If the client is 30, “maybe married, thinking about having children, maybe buying a house, then you need to know, what is the down payment,” Foley says. “That’s all part of the equation, and then you can make a cash flow or budgeting analysis. You figure out how much you spend for a hobby or for entertainment or for dining out.”

If the client has a house and kids already, the focus can shift to their futures. “College is expensive, so if a couple wants to help pay tuition, they might want to look at a 529 plan, which has tax-positive consequences,” Foley says. “That can be a very meaningful vehicle for tuition.” Depending on the specific plan, college funds are usually not taxed while the cash grows or when it is withdrawn for qualified higher education expenses.

Creating a Financial Road Map

“When it comes to planning, it’s never too early,” Griffith says. “When I talk to people about the financial planning process, I compare it to using GPS. A GPS asks two questions: Where do you want to go? And where are you starting from?”

Often, the destination is retirement. “But what does retirement look like to that person? To people in their 30s, 40s or 50s, retirement is a different thing than in the past—a lot of us still want to do things and be relevant,” Griffith says.

“People generally retire from or to something,” he says. “They’ll tell me, ‘I’m really excited about the next stage’—maybe volunteering or spending more time with the grandkids. Or they’re a business owner and say, ‘I can’t be in the rat race anymore.’ ”

Both client and adviser also need to pin down the second part of the GPS analogy: the starting point. “People often don’t understand where they are,” Griffith says.

Clients not only need to know how much is in hand right now, “but how much can they count on from Social Security and their investments, and what are their fixed costs,” Foley says. “If they stop working, that revenue stream from the job stops. So what type of lifestyle do they want to live? Do they have enough money coming in? If they’re on the path, we monitor things to make sure something hasn’t changed.”

Sometimes, things do change, whether due to divorce, a job change or another reason. “And we say, ‘Oh, boy, given current allocations, you’re going to run out of money if you think you’re going to live another 30 years,” Foley says.

That scenario can happen even to high-income clients, he says. “A lot of times, a couple makes a lot of money, and you think, ‘Oh, they’ll be fine.’ But then you see they have country club fees,” plus other expenses that will undoubtedly increase over the years, necessitating course corrections in their plan. “So, a lot of what financial planners do is getting peace of mind for their clients,” Foley says.

“Having a plan to look back on—that road map—it’s peace of mind,” Herzog agrees. “To know you can throw factors in and know you can be OK. Obviously, all different life stages have so many different factors, and everyone’s story is different.”

When clients are in their 30s and 40s, “they’re more in the accumulator stage, maybe paying down debt,” she says. “So you have to discuss debt management. In their 50s and 60s, it’s about planning for retirement. People really want to know if they have to make lifestyle changes.”

The Emotion Factor

The big question currently on many investors’ minds is: What about inflation?

“It’s challenging” Herzog says. “People are scared, and I understand why. But it’s not as severe as the headlines might make you believe. With a good investment strategy, you should be outpacing it. It’s going to be coming down soon, hopefully, as long as you have a good team behind you, helping you stay ahead of it.”

Inflation fears are one of many feelings that advisers help clients cope with. “I think one of the secrets of the financial planning industry is that really almost all those decisions are inherently emotional in nature,” Griffith says.

“Do I want to retire? The numbers can give more or less comfort, but every single element in deciding when or if you want to retire is associated with people feeling comfortable with that decision,” he says. “The people I find most effective in this industry understand their clients’ emotions. Emotional intelligence is a huge part of being successful.”

Emotional intelligence is something Herzog believes is an advantage that she and other women who work as financial planners have in the industry, which “is super-skewed to men.”

“Even at conferences I attend, we joke that it’s the only place where the men’s restroom line is longer than the women’s,” she says with a laugh.

Whether or not that emotional advantage holds true, what is undeniable is the fact that more and more women are consulting financial advisers—or will need to soon. Today, women control a third of total U.S. household financial assets—more than $10 trillion, according to a McKinsey study. But by 2030, American women are expected to control much of the $30 trillion in financial assets that baby boomers will possess.

For Herzog, those numbers are promising. She offers one final bit of advice to investors seeking a financial adviser, regardless of gender: “When you’re finding an adviser, you should ask if they are a fiduciary. A fiduciary is required by law to act in your best interest, someone who is not getting incentives to get you to go for certain products.”

Doing so, she says, will help ensure your adviser is motivated to maximize returns on your portfolio—not their own pocketbook.

Tim Feran is a freelance writer.

This story is from the Winter 2024 issue of Columbus CEO.