FAQ Session with Beth Bosworth and Rafia Hasan from Perigon Wealth Management

Discover the FAQs Beth and Rafia, Wealth Management Experts, Tackle Daily

Welcome to our latest FAQ session featuring two experts from Perigon Wealth Management: Beth Bosworth, Head of Wealth Planning and Wealth Advisor, and Rafia Hasan, Chief Investment Officer. As part of our ongoing partnership with Perigon Wealth Management, we continue to prioritise empowering our USA network across elite sports in securing their financial futures.

Following our recent partnership with Perigon, where Marc Specht, Head of Sports and Entertainment, joined our advisory board, we are excited to bring you another opportunity to gain insights from the wealth management industry's leading minds.

In today's session, we aim to address some of the most commonly asked questions in wealth planning and investment strategy. From retirement planning to portfolio management, Beth and Rafia will share their expertise, offering valuable perspectives and practical advice that can benefit our network immensely.

“What Annual Investment Return Can I Expect?”

“The annual investment return that you can expect is dependent on a number of factors that include the risk that you take in your portfolio, the mix of investments that are used based on your objectives and market returns. Different investments have different levels of risk and expected returns. For example stocks tend to be riskier than bonds and therefore have higher returns. Alternative investments have a diverse range of expected returns depending on the type of investment used. On average over the last 40 years stocks have returned 11.6% annually, whereas bonds have returned 6.3%.1 It is important to remember though that markets are volatile and the averages noted earlier do not reflect the return achieved each year so an investor must be disciplined and stay invested over the long-term to achieve the returns above.” - Rafia Hasan

“How Does Inflation Play Into My Financial Plan?”

“Inflation is one of the key assumptions that can be left up to the planner’s discretion. Obviously, we are coming out, we hope, of a time where inflation is a hot topic. We use assumptions that are largely dependent upon the timeline of the spending. For example, if a client has 30+ years of spending then it is likely more accurate to assume closer to average inflation of maybe 2.5-3%. We would likely vary from that traditional inflation number for spending like medical or college costs, as the timeline is shorter and our current inflation data is more appropriate to use. The same would apply for clients of higher age where the timeline is condensed.” - Beth Bosworth

“In building out your investment allocation we take into account the inflation sensitivity of different types of investments and the need for your investments to keep up with and exceed inflation.” - Rafia Hasan

“What Do You Consider The Strongest Tool in Financial Planning?”

“I would say that taking advantage of the Roth environment is one of the most powerful tools available, which is where you enjoy tax-free growth. It is commonly thought that higher earners don’t have easy access to this tool, but that really isn’t always the case. For our business owners, especially, we can look at creating our own retirement plan with a Roth addition, and for our early retired individuals we can use income tax planning to look for lower income years to convert to Roth.” - Beth Bosworth

1 Source: Dimensional Returns 2.0 Stock Market = S&P 500 Bond Market = Bloomberg U.S. Aggregate Bond Index

“What Do We View Taxes in Retirement/When Distributing From My Investments?”

“Tax-efficiency of investments is an important consideration for clients in high earning years, but is equally important to keep in mind for the distribution phase. We have tools that we use to manage the tax consequences for clients in retirement. A few of these strategies include using municipal bonds that are tax-advantaged, proactively tax-loss harvesting and accumulating losses that can be carried forward to offset gains in the future.” - Rafia Hasan

“To add to that, we want to create cash flow structures to cover retirement spending in a tax-conscious manner. We create and annually adjust the funding sources for spending according to annual taxable income projections, and always look for opportunities to create taxable income through Roth conversion in years of lower income or higher deductions. Lastly, we should all be looking at how to invest in a tax-efficient manner, called asset location, which can enhance overall success rates of the financial plan. This is done by putting your higher risk/return assets in the most tax advantaged title such as a Roth, while placing your more tax inefficient assets (income producing) like corporate bonds or some alternatives in an IRA/401k.” - Beth Bosworth

“What Do You Think About Investing in the Private Markets? Start Ups?”

“Private market investments are a growing part of the overall investing landscape and at times may offer expected returns and differentiated exposures than public market investments. We have considerable experience investing across the landscape of private equity, private credit and private real assets. Some of the funds we recommend to clients provide exposure to venture capital funds that invest in companies in earlier stages of their lifecycle including start-ups. While private market investing is an exciting space we recognize that these investments can carry additional risk and maintaining appropriate diversification within private markets is key.” - Rafia Hasan

“What Investment Return Do You Use in a Financial Plan?”

“This can vary a good deal by client, depending on their risk tolerance and time horizon. The most important practice is to be conservative and allow for reasonable risk to be captured, as well, so the simulations will take into account tough investment markets. We don’t have a lofty investment return/risk assumption to make a financial plan work. We want the financial plan to work in all types of markets.” - Beth Bosworth

“How Do I Know How Much Money I Can Give Away?”

“A Financial Planner can talk to you about Critical Capital, which is how much money do you need to fund your retirement goals or

be financially independent. Gifting to family or causes can happen beyond that, and taxes should always be considered to be sure that your transfer of wealth is done in an optimal way.” - Beth Bosworth

“How Much Money Do I Need to Retire/Be Financially Independent?”

“I get asked the question all the time. And, I always answer with the question “how much do you spend each year.” After a quick reminder that I am focused on lifestyle spending, meaning your overall number to live the life in which you have become accustomed, then that number can be used to give a very quick estimate of how much you need to have in liquid assets (cash, investments) to retire by dividing it by 5%. Sometimes I vary from the 5% number depending on factors, but that is a good place to do a very quick back of the napkin analysis.” - Beth Bosworth

“Why is Doing/Having a Financial Plan Important?”

“I’m a firm believer that if you write down your goals you are much more likely to achieve them. Creating a financial plan is the same - while not everything will go according to plan - you have a concrete plan in place to guide you, measure yourself against and help you understand if you are on track.” - Rafia Hasan

“I love the quote from Eleanor Roosevelt that says “it takes as much energy to wish as it does to plan.” Your energy is going to go towards thinking about it, hoping for it, so why not put it into planning for it so you have some of the answers about what life can look like for you in the coming 5, 20 or even 50 years. A Financial Plan, once made, turns into a guide for financial decisions moving forward so you can model any big decision you face, and also look for opportunities in future years to optimize the results.” - Beth Bosworth

“How Does One Prepare For Their First Meeting With A Financial Planner? What Does This First Meeting Cover?”

“I always ask to do some data gathering up front (either in conversation or by trading documents) which includes a request of the Household Balance Sheet (all assets and liabilities), an estimate of monthly spending plus lump sum expenses for the next 24 months, and a most recent tax return. These data points can allow for customized preparation of a current financial profile and the start of building a trajectory for a potential client. Just remember, we are here to help you achieve your goals so plan to be transparent.” - Beth Bosworth

Beth and Rafia’s expertise to the financial well-being of their clients make them a great asset to Perigon Wealth Management and our network at PSN. We eagerly anticipate the guidance they will bring to our network. If you would like to connect with Beth and/or Rafia or have enquiries about any of the above, please click the link below.