6 lies your financial advisor is telling you. Here’s how you can spot them

Akanksha JainJun 20, 2017, 12:39 IST

When it comes to wealth planning, you always turn to your financial advisor for best investments and planning.

At this point of time, where the government is tweaking rules and regulations in the financial sector, one must be careful and look for ways to safeguard their savings.

Apart from protecting your savings, an individual investor also looks for multiplying the wealth and here the role of a financial advisor becomes important.

Pay attention to how your financial advisor discusses and approaches risk. The best and most trustworthy financial advisors tend to be completely open about risk. If someone downplays risks, run for the hills.

Christopher Elliott, who in a LinkedIn influencer and specializes in solving unsolvable consumer problems, says, “When it comes to getting advice -- especially financial advice -- truth can be such a relative thing. Few advisors will tell you an outright lie.”

That’s true. But how do you spot them?

Here are 6 lies your financial advisor is telling you and how you can nail them

See 6 lies your financial advisor is telling you. Here’s how you can spot them >>

1. No fees:

"When an advisor says there is no commission involved you should be leery," says Brent Wilsey, who runs the San Diego-based Wilsey Asset Management. Companies build a façade that makes it look like your investment is fee-free. "But in reality, they hide the fees by burying them deep into documents," he adds. In other words: There's no such thing as "free."

2. Trust me, I have a title:

"That is perhaps the biggest lie," says Warren Ward, a Columbus, Ind.-based financial advisor. "They are apparently free to call themselves pretty much anything: advisor, counselor, wealth manager," he adds.

3. Look at these returns:

Some advisers overstate compound interest. The equation is something like this: "If you invest $A over the course of B years you will earn $C because the average rate of return of this fund (or market) is D%" But wait. "The problem with this equation is that no one can score that rate of return every year," says Jordan Wolff, the chief savings officer for Shrinkabill Services, a financial services firm. The math treats this as a consistent earning every year. And that's not accurate.

4. Did we forget to mention that?

Few advisors will tell you an outright lieMany terms and fees are buried in difficult-to-read prospectuses, and you may not be able to decipher the true costs of some investments. Remember, Registered Investment Advisors and Investment Advisor Representatives are required to act in a fiduciary role, while Registered Representatives may earn a commission.

5. This investment has no risk:

There's no such thing as no risk. If your advisor is telling you otherwise, you might want to look elsewhere.

6. It's do or die:

Shady investment advisors love fear tactics. It takes patience to succeed. Bad advisors push clients to make a decision because they are afraid of losing a sale, not because the market is going to change. If your advisor is scaring you, maybe you have the wrong advisor

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