Helping Your Financial Advisor Couple Clients Take Financial Responsibility

Working with couples in your financial advisory firm is probably one of the most difficult and rewarding things you can do as an advisor. When you work with a couple as a team, you not only get the chance to dramatically help them improve their chances for financial success, but you can also help them deepen and strengthen their relationship. As a mentor and a fiduciary, those are pretty powerful achievements! Helping your couple clients work together and determine things like spending discretion and budgeting are keys to a successful relationship. In my experience, it also helps to talk to them about financial responsibility as many couples have never determined who is in charge of what and why, which leads to misunderstandings and arguments. Here are some ways to help your couple clients with financial responsibility.

Determining Who Should Take Responsibility

If you’re like me, your couple clients probably fall into one of two categories. The first is where one member of the couple has all the control over finances including making the money and determining how it is spent and the other is a silent observer. The other situation is where the couple tries to split everything equally so that neither has more power than the other. Guess what? Neither of these scenarios is a successful one when it comes to handling finances.

The key to taking financial responsibility is deciding which member of the couple is more suited to handle most of the work and then determining how they can work together to make mutual decisions. Here’s how to determine which spouse fits the bill:

Who has more interest? Which member of the couple watches financial news, understands the market, and seems to have a way with numbers? Who has the personality type that is more analytical? That person is likely to have more interest in handling the finances and should be the natural choice.

Who has the most knowledge? If one member of a couple has a background in finance or money management, he or she is almost always the best person to take the lead on family finances. Not only will he or she be able to understand complex issues better, but they will also probably be the same person who takes the most interest in these types of things.

Who has more time? In some cases, one member of the couple will have more time to devote to financial matters than the other. If one person is working 60 hours a week while the other has more free time, the one who has room in his or her schedule to devote to financial matters is probably the best choice.

Set a Discussion Schedule

Make sure you reiterate to your clients that just because one of them is taking the lead on financial matters, it doesn’t mean the other has to remain a ‘silent partner’. Without both spouses being on the same page and making mutual decisions, resentments and disagreements will inevitably occur. That’s why I recommend that the couples I work with set a regular meeting schedule to discuss finances. In most cases, meeting monthly makes sense so the bills for the month can be discussed as well as any upcoming big expenditures. This is a great time for your clients to voice concerns, ask each other questions, and re-establish that they are both playing for the same team.

When your clients are in synch about their finances, they are more likely to have a fulfilling relationship and also have a much better chance at achieving their retirement goals. As an advice-based financial planner, it’s your responsibility to challenge them to strengthen their skills at discussing and delegating finances in the way that best suits their relationship. Have questions about mentoring your couple clients? Please reach out so we can talk more!

When you become a mentor to your clients, deeply understand them, and guide them toward a better future, then you've learned the ways of a financial caregiver. You've come to know what it means to be a true purveyor of advice, and how to use money as a conduit to a more fulfilling life for yourself and those you serve. 

Patrick Tucker, owner of True Measure Wealth Management and founder of True Measure Financial Advisors, has over 20 years experience in the industry and has spent the last 15 years learning the ins and outs of the fee-only advisory business. He's spent over $500,000 finding mentors, studying consulting businesses, taking courses, studying the soft sciences, running trial and error experiments, and learning how to be an entrepreneurial financial advisor. He's simplified this into an easy to use blueprint for anyone who is entrepreneurial-minded and is tired of the sales culture. Patrick has been able to acquire over $158 million under management with little to no money spent on marketing.