Maximize your Investment Returns: 11 Questions for your Advisors

Very few advisors can beat the market returns over time "In every period, low-cost funds beat high-cost funds" Last year's genius is usually this year's idiot Advisors can't predict future returns over time Advisors want to attract short-term money for current profits I have been in the financial services business for over 20 years. Commoditization has come to the financial advice business. Unless you have millions of dollars to let an experienced Registered Investment Advisors (RIA) build on, you are going to overpay for advice that can't beat the markets over time. The key question is what is your timeline. Are you investing to get rich quickly or are you investing to retire with $1 million in about 35 years? No legitimate RIA can promise the first goal yet many "professional" advisors imply that their work will make you wealthy. They don't mention a timeline. The fact is that over time, very few advisors can beat the stock market returns that average 10-12% a year. As you know, there is no way to know which advisors will succeed in the future. So, how can we maximize our investment returns over time? Some of us have decided to go the "do-it-yourself" route. We figure that since an advisor can't beat 'em, we'll join 'em. We join with others as owners of shares of a market index fund. This mutual fund owns the same stocks as a market index that represents a good sample of all stock companies. Others have already been using an advisor and believe that it is better to let this person worry about the ups and downs of the markets. They are willing to pay 1-3% for this "hand-holding" process. They are willing to pay for the costs of trading and the taxes that result from buying and selling. What may not be known about using an advisor is how to evaluate their products-investment strategies and securities. I show you how to evaluate and maximize your returns.