Fool on the Hill

I was looking through a packet of marketing materials that Our Pick, Eric, gave us early on. I noticed that there was a reprint of a great article in there from the Motley Fool. I was able to find the article online and you can view it by clicking here.

The article is about Edward Jones and what makes them different from the rest of the financial industry. Along with the article, there was a list of about 20 other awards that Edward Jones has won. All of those are nice, but this article really stuck out to me because the whole goal of the Motley Fool website is to get people to not invest through brokers. So, it says a lot for them to write that Edward Jones is the best brokerage and people should not hesitate to work with them. Indeed, I full heartedly agree with everything that is written in the article. After reading the article, it is no surprise to me that of the 20 'finalists' in our selection process, 11 of them were from Edward Jones.

Best of 1000!

When Jen and I completed our first round of 600 financial professionals and decided on Our Pick for best financial professional, we thought we had done a pretty good job. Then, we asked ourselves why 600? Neither of us really knew, we just thought is was a good number at the time. So, we decided to expand our search to 1000 financial professionals. This time, we focused more on independent brokers and insurance 'wealth managers' along with people from the major brokerages. Our biggest challenge that we have heard to this point is that independent brokers have greater flexibility in providing services to their clients. Here's what we found: independent brokers are just as money hungry, if not more so, than those who work for major brokerages. Of course, this is just our opinion and, naturally, there are some great financial professionals who are independent. However, we found the above to be the average of our experiences. Along with this, we found that independent brokers were more likely to use market timing and options as investment strategies, presumably because they don't have such heavy oversight as those who work for larger firms. In the end, Our Pick hasn't changed. We are just that much more behind Eric as our selection.

BrokerCheck

Today, Eric and I were reviewing the FAST reports that he had created for me (see his interview for more info on what FAST is), when out of the blue Eric asked me if I had ever looked up his BrokerCheck report.

Apparently, FINRA, which was created when the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD) merged together, tracks every broker and reports their history, where they work, what licenses they have, and most importantly, if they have any complaints against them.

Now, this says a lot about Eric, I think. Obviously he is confident enough in his abilities as a financial advisor that he would point out that I should pull up his record. Of course, that's exactly what I did. As expected, no complaints. Interestingly enough, I also looked up the broker who came in second. She had three complaints against her. Wow! I would have never known.

You are not in compliance ...

On Monday, my wife and I were waiting for our airplane at LAX. We were looking forward to our trip to Ontario to visit our son. My phone rings and on the other end is Our Pick, Eric Wilson.

Over the next few minutes, Eric tells me why he doesn't think he will be able to be listed as our choice. He goes on to tell me that other people need to be listed on the website, or it will appear that he is sponsoring the site himself. Also, I did not initially represent the interview with Eric as an interview, but instead I told him that I just wanted to get some more info. When I posted it word-for-word as an interview, it created a compliance issue for Eric because apparently, according the the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) Eric is supposed to get permission before participating in an interview-style conversation.

Wow, I was mad. I got on the plane and was agitated the entire way to Ontario. The next morning, I had to speak with my attorney about a property I was selling, so I decided to ask about the website and everything Eric had mentioned to me. My attorney quickly responded back that I should be happy that Edward Jones has the concerns that they do and that the strict compliance requirements that they and the SEC have placed on Eric as a financial advisor are actually there to protect clients against unscrupulous brokers.

He was right. Edward Jones was doing the right thing for their clients and the public. So, I calmed down and, over the next day or so, communicated back and forth with Eric and Edward Jones to get everything straight. In the end, they agreed to let Eric be on the site, and everything is good to go.

What's the moral of the story? Not only is Eric a great financial advisor, but he works for a company that really does put a considerable amount of time and energy protecting their clients. In the end, we like Eric even more because of this!

Up and Running

After much work, GreatFA.com is officially up and running. Are there still a few typos? Probably. Feel free to contact us to let us know about them and we will correct them right away. In the mean time, look for new blog posts about Our Pick in the very near future.

Initial Interview

Today I met with Eric at the Center Club, a local business club that both of us belong to. We chatted for a while and then I told him that I would like to do a quick interview with him to ask him some basic questions so we could lay a foundation of what people can expect when working with him. I didn't tell him that I was going to do this before hand, so he had no idea that this was coming. He seemed excited at the idea, and so we spent about an hour going through some questions about Eric. I will be posting the answers on GreatFA.com, and will place a link here once everything is up and running.

Little Shocked

Today I called Eric and told him that I needed to meet before the end of the day. He explained that he was booked solid, but could schedule me for a 10 minute phone consultation in the afternoon if I needed to talk to him urgently. I gladly accepted. You see, this is why I love this guy. He is busy busy busy. But, he still will get you in right away if it's an urgent matter. With my last advisor, I would have gotten his voice mail in the first place, and I would have been lucky to get a call back in a week ... unless I indicated that I needed to do something in my account where he would make money.

Anyways, back to the story. I scheduled a call with Eric at 1:00pm. Still testing him, I looked at my cell phone to see how long after 1:00 he actually would call me. Sure enough, within 5 seconds of 1:00, the phone was ringing. When I answered, Eric asked my how my family was and what he could help me with. The conversation went something like...

Me: Eric, I appreciate all your help over the last couple of months. I know I've been rough on you.

Eric: Mike, I'm here for my clients. Without them I'm just some guy in a suit. I have had a great time talking with you about your goals.

Me: Well, I have to be honest. I have been setting you up for something. I hope you aren't going to be mad.

Eric: silent .... still silent .... nothing ... Okay???

Me: Eric, I run a website called GreatFA.com. Over the last four months, I have interviewed and, frankly, tortured over 500 financial professionals. I want you to know that I have picked you as the best financial professional to work with out of all of them.

Eric: See, Mike, I knew that you were a big joker. Nice try on the practical joke...

Me: No, I'm serious. If you go to the website, all your info is there. I am going to market this site so that everyone knows how good you are.

At this point, there was a lot of 'uh, wow, uh, I don't, uh..." and so on. I explained to Eric how the competition had worked, and he was absolutely shocked.

The good news is that now we can really start testing him. On this blog, you will find regular updates about my interactions with Eric and how he treats me as a client. Along with this, I am going to send in some spies occasionally to represent themselves as prospective clients. Check back here to see how everything progresses!