When Your Financial Advisor Talks Over Your Head

In my early thirties, I was very new to investing.

I knew it was something I was supposed to do, but I didn’t know where to start.

After getting some advice from a well-known radio personality, I decided to work with one of their Endorsed Local Providers.

My wife did not enjoy this investment broker consistently talking over our heads, but I thought with his professional credentials and endorsements that it would be great for us.

I should have listened to my wife.

My lack of understanding of investment fees and this person's motivation to sell, left us feeling like we were being sold more than we were being taught.

We were looking for a teacher.

Not a salesperson.

Evidently, there’s something called a “Front End Load Fee” that is an investment fee that has a percentage of the investment (usually 2% to 5%) go directly to the broker.

In my case, our front-end load fee was on the higher end of that sliding scale.

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Shortly after this major financial error on my part, we decided to leave our investment broker completely.

I dove headfirst into managing our investments.

With this new challenge, I vowed to educate myself so this would never happen again.

One area that I took a special interest in was investment fees.

Depending on who you work with, there can be plenty of them.

Empower offers a free "Fee Analyzer" tool that has helped me analyze and figure out where I can lower my investment fees.

This tool opened my eyes to some blind spots in my new solo investing journey.

Since parting with our investment broker, we have fared pretty well.

In 2020, we crossed over the $1,000,000 net worth mark and are looking at a very comfortable retirement.

Do you know how much you're paying in investment fees?

As I've learned, the more information YOU have on your investing journey, the better off you'll be.