PERSONAL. WEALTH MANAGEMENT
we're different. by design.
Business Financial & Personal Wealth Planning
Your investment portfolio is much more than a 401(k). It includes your income, your finances, your retirement accounts and other investments such as stock options, your business or practice, real estate and rental properties. Together, your total wealth should be brought into a cohesive alignment with your near-term and long-term goals, the amount of risk you are comfortable carrying, the uniqueness of your life, your dreams, and your circumstances.
For this reason, we work with you to complete a comprehensive, goals-based financial plan that is used to create and manage a customized investment portfolio that gives you the best chance of reaching each one of your goals.
Your plan is unique. And when your situation changes? Your plan will change, too.
Professional & Comprehensive Wealth Management
Although we design and manage customized portfolios, we do much more. We recognize that a comprehensive and personal solution must encompass each part of your personal and professional wealth including your retirement and other investment accounts, your business or professional practice, your stock options and deferred wages, your real estate, tax planning, college funding, insurances, estate plans ... all of it.
Over time we bring every piece into a comprehensive plan and build an investment strategy to make certain the each part is aligned with and supportive of your goals.
Fiduciary • Independent • Transparent
- Always Fiduciaries. At Clearstone, our experienced and credentialed advisors are required by law to always act in your best interest. We do this without exception.
- Free of Conflicts of Interest. We are independent. This means that we never try to sell proprietary investment mutual funds, ETFs, or other products. In fact, we don't even have them. Instead, we are able to build your portfolio from thousands of investment options.
- Fee-Only & Transparent. We have never earned a commission or received payments from third-parties for our investment advice. And we never will. Instead, our fees are simple, readily explained, and transparent.
FEE-ONLY • INDEPENDENT • FIDUCIARY
The Highest Industry Standard
In today's financial services industry, the terminology is becoming ever more confusing: advisor, broker, chartered financial analyst and, more recently, fiduciary. Understanding this last term can make a huge difference when considering what kind of advisor you have and how they manage your money.
What is a fiduciary?
A fiduciary is a person given the power to act on behalf of another and put their interests first.
The advisor, as a fiduciary, owes the client a duty of loyalty, which means they must act in the best interest of the client.
Additionally, the advisor owes the client a duty of care, which means the advisor's advice, based on a reasonable inquiry of the client's financial situation, investment experience and investment objectives, is in the client's best interest.
In other words, according to the Securities and Exchange Commission rules and the Investment Advisors Act of 1940, the five responsibilities of a fiduciary are:
- Put client's interests first.
- Act with the utmost good faith.
- Provide full and fair disclosure of all material facts.
- Do not mislead clients.
- Expose all conflicts of interest.
What is Fee-Only?
A "fee-only advisor is directly compensated by clients and do not "sell" financial products (such as annuities or loaded mutual funds), receive commissions or any other payment from third parties, banks or other institutions. They sit on the same side of the table as their clients as they work to increase the value of their investments while improving their total net-worth.
A fee-based advisor receives commissions for selling financial products and can charge a fee for planning and advice. These commissions usually are taken from the investment the client has made. If they are a part of an institution such as a bank or broker-dealer, they could also receive a bonus for selling particular investments.
We have always been fee-only and have never received a commission or third-party payments for any of our investment recommendations.
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