The Baby Boomer generation, classified as anyone born between 1946 and 1964, will be as old as 76 and as young as 58 years old in 2022. According to Statistics Canada, about 5,000 baby boomers are retiring every week and this is going to mean big changes for Canada’s labour market but what does this mean for the key professionals in your life? Do you have new medical professionals lined up, like a doctor and a dentist? What about any legal issues, do you have a new lawyer in mind? How about your finances, is there a plan as to who will take over once your current advisor retires? The problem is that you may get whomever your current professional decides, regardless of whether you actually get along with them or not, and hopefully your current professional ensures that it is the best person for the job. Some professionals simply retire and do not have anyone taking their place so then it is up to you to try to find someone that you can trust.

I can only speak to the financial industry as that is where my expertise lies. A recent survey found that 51% of advisors were 55 years of age and older. If your age is around the same as your current advisor’s age and you are thinking about retirement then you can be certain that they are too. The most expensive years in retirement are usually going to be your first decade and your last so who is going to help you make the ongoing difficult decisions to ensure your future success? A lot changes when your flip the switch from appreciation of assets to depreciation of assets and you may not have the excess to afford to make any mistakes. Once your employment income stops, every decision that you make is important because the repercussions of any decision will be amplified twenty, thirty, or potentially forty years in the future.

So how do you do it? How do you trust someone that can be as young as half of your age with your life savings? Your savings that you have tirelessly worked decades to build, through the good times and the bad, so that you can eventually clock-out for the last time. The Canadian financial industry is becoming more and more regulated as time goes on, and so it should. There is ongoing discussion of reserving certain titles solely for individuals that are willing to put in the time and effort to show that they are committed to their clients but, unfortunately, there is no Canada-wide standardization yet. The terms “financial advisor” and “financial planner” are still used broadly and do not always mean that a person has specific qualifications, expertise or certifications. However, there are certain designations that you can look for. I’d stress that having a qualified and accredited financial planner is one of the most important qualifications. Your financial representative may have their Personal Financial Planner (PFP), Certified Financial Planner (CFP), or Registered Financial Planner (RFP) and, without going into the nuances of each of them, I’d suggest that this is the first qualification that you look for. A planner will be able to help quantify your vision into financial goals and show you the different paths to achieve your goals. Would you agree to surgery by someone who has never taken specialized education in their field? Your medical health should be looked at the same way as your financial health because you want to ensure that you get the correct diagnosis.

Another way to plan for your financial future is to ask your current advisor about their succession plans. If you currently work with only one advisor then it isn’t bad to ask about their retirement and succession plans. You are simply trying to cover your bases and get as much information as possible so that you can plan your own future. They should have a clear and specific answer for you, if not already having someone specifically in mind that you can start to be introduced to. If your current advisor is already using a multi-generational team approach then I’d say you are safe but it never hurts to ask. Getting as much information about their plans for the future allows you to have more confidence in your own future.

The goal of this article isn’t to scare you, the goal is to get you thinking. Not only do you need to be making the right decisions today for your own financial future but it also matters who you choose to have in your corner. The older person that you will one day be is relying on the decisions that you make today.

Want to chat more? Reach out to me at info@financerx.ca