Mark Nestmann writes in the Sovereign Society’s Offshore A-letter about how you can evaluate the financial health of the companies you rely upon for insurance.

Among his suggestions: Read the rest of this entry »

Boy! Was I naive!

Kind of like my thinking with respect to estate planning ten years ago, I thought writing an Investment Policy Statement should be pretty straightforward. All I needed, I thought, was some professional help to give me the right words.

But I’ve discovered that is not the case at all–a discovery that is both frustrating (because it means I have a lot more work to do!) and happy at the same time (because I made the discovery; I haven’t made any more foolish or irrevocable mistakes in this area . . . yet).

Way beyond getting the “right words” on paper, Sarita and I need to answer some very fundamental questions–questions far deeper than the average investment advisor is likely to ask or help us answer. Read the rest of this entry »

Yesterday I posted a proposed draft copy of an IPS (Investment Policy Statement) our legacy planners gave me. I said I didn’t feel comfortable signing the document without further input . . . from our investment advisor himself and, perhaps, one or two other similar advisors.

Today I thought I would share some of the things I wrote to our investment advisor about the document. So here’s the cover letter I sent him: Read the rest of this entry »

Our legacy planners have urged us to create an Investment Policy Statement (IPS) that would enable outside onlookers (like my wife and me and/or our legacy planners, for instance) to say, “Yes, [our investment advisor] is living up to the requirements of our IPS. He or she is investing according to policy.” Or, “No. He has violated this parameter. He needs to come back into line.”

Right now, we have no such statement and, as a result, we can’t really be sure whether and to what extent our investment advisor is pursuing a particular plan or simply “going with the flow” of whatever happens to cross his mind at the moment.

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Originally, our legacy planners asked our investment advisor to give them copies of his current investment policies for our various accounts.

And our investment advisor objected to what looked like an attempt on their part to “butt in” on his area of expertise. “Why do they need to know about my investment policies? What does that have to do with legacy planning?” he asked.

Part of his concern arose from the fact that our legacy planners work for a firm that, in addition to legacy planning, offers investment advisory services. He was concerned they were “simply” going to attempt to second-guess him and, with 20-20 hindsight, demonstrate what a bad job he has done in the last year in the midst of our rather unprecedentedly awful market performance.

Our legacy planners were able to put that fear to rest. “We are not looking to steal your business. We charge the high fees we do so that we have absolutely no need to sell other services. Our services are completely separate from the ‘other side’ of the company. . . .”

Still, the question remained: “What does an investment policy have to do with legacy planning?” Read the rest of this entry »

Charles W. Collier, in Wealth in Families, expands on the theme urged by James E. Hughes, Jr. to which I’ve alluded in the past–the idea that, as Collier quotes Hughes (perhaps from a personal interview; I have been unable to find these exact words in either of Hughes’ books themselves): “A family’s duty is to work to preserve the family’s principal wealth-generating assets: its human and intellectual capital. The family leadership and governance structure should provide an environment that values and enhances each family member’s ability to pursue their individual life calling.”

As I have meditated on Hughes’ comments and, more recently, on what Collier says, I have realized, on the one hand, that they call our attention to things most of us ignore to our peril. On the other, I have realized that there are several other asset classes that they don’t really address.

I would like to call your attention to four such non-financial, wealth-generating asset classes. What follows, then, combines a bit of Hughes, a bit of Collier, and serious dollop of John Holzmann as well. Read the rest of this entry »

Almost 3 years ago, one of my very first posts (Oh! It was my first post!) was a book by Alan Gotthardt called The Eternity Portfolio.

Yesterday morning, I attended a meeting at which Gary Hoag, the vice president for “Advancement” (i.e., fundraising) for Denver Seminary, spoke. Among other things, he presented what he calls The Stewardship Portfolio, a small portion of Gotthardt’s larger presentation.

In essence, says Hoag, (and, again, this is really a minor modification of what Gotthardt says): according to Scripture, we can divide our giving into nine categories within a 3 x 3 matrix divided, across the top, by type of ministry, and, down the side, by where the ministry occurs. Read the rest of this entry »

You know about investment portfolio management. And I’m sure you take time to ensure you invest wisely for financial returns. But what about eternal rewards? Read the rest of this entry »