How Hourly Planning Democratizes Financial Advice
A few years ago, we explored concierge medicine. A local practice had come highly recommended, and as someone who lives and breathes client experience, I was intrigued.
We had a preliminary call. As much as I loved the model, the philosophy and how they approached client care, at the end of the day we couldn’t justify the cost. We would be paying a significant premium for a level of service that surpassed our actual needs.
Fortunately, in this country, concierge medicine is not the only option for healthcare.
But what about financial care?
Most fee-only financial advisors charge a percentage of assets under management (AUM) and then do “everything you need” as part of that fee.
- Managing investments? ✅
- Call and emails? ✅
- Meetings? ✅
- Comprehensive financial planning? ✅
- Coordination with other providers? ✅
- Money movement? ✅
They do it all. In fact, plenty of advisors describe themselves as a “financial concierge.”
The AUM model in my opinion is very much like concierge medicine. You are paying a premium to delegate full control to someone else. And that might make sense for you.
But, if concierge medicine was the only way to access healthcare, we’d have a pretty sick population. So, why is concierge financial care still the primary way to access independent, objective financial advice and what does that say for our overall financial health?
Not everyone:
- Has the investable assets required to work with a concierge advisor.
- Needs to delegate 💯 to someone else.
- Wants to pay an annuity for an asset allocation when it’s the market doing the actual work.
- Uses every service their concierge advisor offers.
We founded Sanctuary Financial Planning as an hourly-only financial planning practice because charging for our time is the most transparent, fair and straightforward way to serve clients. Plus – it democratizes financial services by increasing access to independent, objective financial advice.
You know what we don’t care about at Sanctuary? Your assets. You know why? Because we don’t get paid based on the amount of money we can manage for you. We get paid for the time we spend working with you to solve your financial problems. When your problem is solved – the clock turns off. When a new problem emerges – the clock turns back on. What could be more straightforward than that?
If you want to pay a premium, there are plenty of concierges who would love to work with you.
But if you are looking for financial advice that goes beyond your assets, there is Sanctuary.
