Advice for Women

Women are increasingly turning to financial advisers about planning and helping them with their financial future.

At First advice we recognise that some Women prefer to work with another women. Women are becoming more financially independent, whether partnered or single, and there are some really important reasons why they should:

1. Longer Life Expectancy - Women live on average 5 years longer than men. They will have a longer retirement and will more than likely be solely responsible for their own finances at some point in their life.
2. Interrupted careers - Many women have family responsibilities that mean they have times out of the work force and times when they work reduced hours. This can quite heavily impact women’s finances by limiting career options and advancement, reducing short term cashflow and impacting retirement savings.
3. Less Knowledge in Finances - Many studies have shown that although women in partnerships often look after the day to day finances they tend to leave the long term planning (such as investing and retirement) to their partner. This is particularly worrying when we consider the high divorce rate (over 50%), and longer life expectancies, many women will be left to manage their finances with little experience.
4. Less Pay - Like it or not, the majority of women earn less than men. This means that women have less income to fund their retirement and lifestyle. So, it’s vital for women to seek professional financial advice to help them make the most of what they’ve got.
5. Divorce and Relationship changes - It’s a sad fact of life, but many marriages and long term relationships breakdown. Statistics do show that women are vulnerable to suffering financial consequences far more than men, who have the ability to rebuild assets more easily.

• Start with your immediate needs - If you need help or your life is changing, there may be some important short-term goals you want to achieve to help get things back on track. Making sure your immediate needs are taken care of is the first step to taking control of your money. Once you feel like this aspect of your life is under control, your better placed to start thinking about your long-term goals – such as planning for your retirement
• Master your cash flow - It’s very common for women to be asset rich (or not) but cash flow poor. This lack of cash can make it harder to change or rebuild your life and to achieve your financial goals. We will help you build a budget and to get a better understanding of your income and expenses.
• Review your risk profile - Helping my clients balance risk in their investments with the time frame they have to grow their wealth is important, often challenging but a necessary discussion. A desire to be conservative is understandable, but less risk tends to result in less return, so this needs to be balanced with the required results. While its good to have some cash available for short-term goals, its important to ensure your taking on enough risk to help your long-term savings grow.