{"id":2719,"date":"2019-07-19T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-07-19T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.iafp.ca\/planners\/blog\/2019\/07\/19\/what-should-you-look-for-in-a-proper-financial-plan\/"},"modified":"2019-07-19T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2019-07-19T04:00:00","slug":"what-should-you-look-for-in-a-proper-financial-plan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.iafp.ca\/planners\/articles\/2019\/07\/19\/what-should-you-look-for-in-a-proper-financial-plan\/","title":{"rendered":"What should you look for in a proper financial plan?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

Do you have a financial plan? It seems like a straight-forward enough question, but is it? In 2019, 54 per cent of Canadians reported having a financial plan. That number hasn\u2019t changed since 2017. The 2017 study goes on further to say that of those who said they have a financial plan, 36 per cent describe it as a budget they review regularly, a short-term plan or ‘other’. By definition, those are not proper financial plans, and means that only 35 per cent of Canadians have financial plans. But do they? What constitutes a proper financial plan anyway?<\/p>\n

True financial planning is about advice, solving problems or creating a plan to achieve one or more goals. You know you have a proper financial plan when:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. It is preceded by a Letter of Engagement.<\/li>\n
  2. It covers six areas of your financial situation, possibly more:\n
      \n
    1. Cash flow & Net Worth<\/li>\n
    2. Investment Planning \/ Strategies<\/li>\n
    3. Retirement \/ Financial Independence Planning<\/li>\n
    4. Risk Management<\/li>\n
    5. Tax Planning<\/li>\n
    6. Estate Planning<\/li>\n
    7. Special Needs<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/li>\n
    8. It identifies goals and objectives using S.M.A.R.T principles – Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Timeline.<\/li>\n
    9. Its assumptions are defined and reasonable.<\/li>\n
    10. It provides alternatives for consideration.<\/li>\n
    11. Its recommendations are based on analysis and are shown to be achievable.<\/li>\n
    12. It provides a timeline for implementing the recommendations.<\/li>\n
    13. It improves your financial literacy by educating you on the subjects that are relevant to you.<\/li>\n
    14. It tells you what you need to know, not necessarily what you want to hear.<\/li>\n
    15. It mentions financial products as a concept only, not by a specific name. i.e. Permanent Life Insurance rather than Manulife Performax Gold.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      The narrative should be tailored to you – short and to the point. There are situations where a modular financial plan may address a specific need, but all areas should be considered in its conclusions. You need to know that the document you receive is a proper, comprehensive financial plan and not simply justification for selling a product.<\/p>\n

      If you are looking for a comprehensive financial plan including the components listed above, I suggest you consult the IAFP\u2019s Find a Planner tool. You can find it here: Find a Planner<\/a>.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      Do you have a financial plan? It seems like a straight-forward enough question, but is it? In…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2720,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iafp.ca\/planners\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2719"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iafp.ca\/planners\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iafp.ca\/planners\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iafp.ca\/planners\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iafp.ca\/planners\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2719"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.iafp.ca\/planners\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2719\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iafp.ca\/planners\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iafp.ca\/planners\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2719"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iafp.ca\/planners\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2719"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iafp.ca\/planners\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}