Maybe this isn't fair to single out Gerstein Fisher and Associates because this problem is probably…read morepar for the course for most financial advisors.
But this is my experience.
You'll get a lot of attention when you first come in and then....every appointment becomes another sales pitch to invest more and/or stay in the market.
Their financial plan seems to be, for them, to do as little as possible. They advise you to stay in the market for the long haul (typical investment "wisdom"/sales-speak)- which enables them to sit on your money collecting annual fees whether you do well, or poorly, while you stay in the market for 30 years.
It's a great plan. For them.
There is no reason you need to come to these advisors to have a plan like theirs: you can go to Fidelity, or Vanguard- you can go to any place that is much much cheaper and do the same thing with either a pre-made plan (which is basically what they do- except they diversify it into lots of tiny accounts so they collect fees on all of them), or you can get a personal advisor at Vanguard and probably at Fidelity too if your balance is high enough.
Once you're in, at GF, you might deal with your planner once a year at most. Usually you deal with low level salespeople who are not financial experts - but who don't call themselves salespeople. It took me a while to realize that's all they are.
They speak to you from a talking-points script which always leads to them telling you to invest more money with them, or leave your money invested where they put it.
They also treat you like you're a financial moron, with exaggerated charts of potential growth (like 6%) which, I guess is industry standard, but it SEEMS like if you're paying a financial advisor, that they'd be more realistic with you.
You could certainly do worse than this company. They're not horrible. But IMHO, they are definitely not worth the money you'll spend on them. The plans they do for you are generic- the same thing you can get on any on-line worksheet for free: "conservative," "aggressive"- the same exact crap.
You don't get an individual plan. Not really. You get put in a bucket- the same way you would at Vanguard or Fidelity or anywhere else: conservative, risky, whatever. Except those places will do it for free if you invest enough money, or you can just invest in index funds, or you can figure out a general plan with free software and/or for much lower fees on your $ instead of them taking 1% of your money every year for 30 years or however long they recommend you keep it there--- forever- plus all of the other fees built into their system that they do by overcomplicating your plan and investing you in a bunch of crap that isn't really diversifying any more than an index fund would do- it just adds fees.
Another route is to pay someone a flat fee to do a long term financial plan. Then see them again on a regular basis.
As I say, GF are probably not the worst- the whole industry of financial advisors seem to be like this. I'm sure they're all nice people who are just doing their job. And maybe if your finances are really complicated, you'll have a different experience with them because they offer wills and trusts etc...
They do get back to you promptly and they are friendly and polite. I'm sure many people are satisfied with them. You could do way worse than them.
But because of the condescending, pro-sales attitude that the people you meet with have, their misleading charts (always assuming 6% or 8% growth)- yes I know- those are the charts everyone uses but come on! And their resistance to do anything other than keep your money in the same place, regardless of market conditions because it serves them better- all of these add up to a strong recommendation to use Vanguard or some other low cost company that you can basically trust, that will cost you a lot less, and that will not strong-arm you to stay in, stay in, stay in the market. (Though with Vanguard, you have to talk to advisors on the phone there, not in person. Fidelity lets you talk to people in person, though it feels like the OTB of investing.)
None of these options are perfect and it is nice to have an advisor who you like and trust and can sit down and talk to. But at GF, you get salespeople in the guise of planners. The sales aspect of it, and the other aforementioned issues, make that trust feel impossible.
I hope they, and other financial advisors, will consider changing their ways. In a world with so much financial information online and so many tools that equal the advice they can give you, it seems that an old school honest accountant, a conservative non-salesy financial advisor who doesn't treat clients like they're boneheads or sell them things that are really wrong for them, an advisor who educates people without trying to confuse them, or make them feel helpless, is what many people need and want.
