Plan A Better Future
Our niche is ethical investing, income certainty in retirement, aged care, and risk management for families and small business.
We help you understand the interplay of cashflow, tax and wealth creation as we track your progress to your retirement and personal goals. Before doing anything else have a read of our Financial Services Guide >
Wealth Creation
Finding The Right Balance
Find the right balance of lifestyle now, and financial security later. We believe in a combination of deliberate planned saving, and smart investment decisions. There is no silver bullet. We guide your investment decisions to be effective now and in future, to meet your spending goals as they occur.
The starting point is your cashflow and spending. Spend less than you earn, and invest the difference. The best way to do this is to set specific, measurable goals. They provide your incentive to save.
We’ll help you prioritise your spending needs and set your investment strategy to suit. The ownership of investments is just as important as the investments themselves.
Save a little, often. A regular investment plan (RIP) takes advantage of volatility inherent in growth investments, which have always been the best way to build long term wealth. Regular investing removes the risk of investing at the wrong time.
We track your progress over the medium term towards your retirement and other goals. Understanding trade-offs is also important. By reviewing your budget we can help you see what is affordable while still being able to meet your medium term wealth creation goals.
So you can find the right balance of quality of life now, and financial security later on.
Start Investing Today
It’s hard not to panic when (share) markets drop and the value of your investments falls dramatically in a short time. Fact. These are paper losses. Are your investments any less valuable today than yesterday just because the market is pricing them 3% cheaper? Has the business of BHP had a 3% drop in earnings overnight?
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Financial Security
Financial Security Is Income Security
Whether you have a family to feed or are retired, you need income for lifestyle essentials. By focusing on guaranteed income, we help clients plan to have enough to live whatever curve balls life may throw.
Lifestyle requirements change, so we help you assess the risk of losing an income, and put in place strategies to replace a wage in the short and medium term. We encourage clients to take on a degree of self-insurance if they can afford to, as this creates the right discipline to get ahead with loan repayments and build a cash buffer.
Your path to financial security can be a lot easier once the kids have left the nest and you’ve cleared your debt. However, when you retire, you’ll need enough money for lifestyle for long enough to manage the longevity risk we now face with increasing life expectancies.
We will help you set up guaranteed income streams for living expenses that are flexible to move with your spending patterns. We like to provide as much certainty for clients as possible, in an uncertain world.
Retirement Planning
Retirement Planning Is All About Risk Management
Our role is to deliver the lifestyle you want today as well as certainty about the future. We help you understand the trade-offs you may need to make to be able to retire comfortably. We believe you can have quality of life now and in retirement, if you are clear on your goals and stick to a plan.
You spend your working life building your retirement pot, and the cusp of retirement is when poor returns can be most damaging. Managing this ‘sequencing risk’, the risk of poor returns when you have the most, is key.
miPlan believes that even in retirement you must still be a growth investor. Because of the longevity risk, and because returns from traditional defensive assets are so low (cash rates etc) we set up an income bucket and a growth bucket for clients.
The income bucket provides certain income for a set period, so that you don’t need to worry about lifestyle expenses. The income bucket also provides a surplus to your living needs, so that you can invest that surplus, into your growth bucket.
The growth bucket is a long term wealth accumulation strategy which will replace the income bucket when needed. This is your risk management plan in essence, as you can benefit from the long term, more volatile returns of growth assets, and not be locked into the low returns of defensive assets.
Investment & Debt Strategies
Investing Goes Hand In Hand With Debt Reduction
While the best time to start investing was 20 years ago the 2nd best time is right now. We will help you understand whether you can afford to invest, or should simply focus on reducing debt.
We work with you to establish debt repayment goals. This is the best way to reduce your risk. We can also guide you to recycle non-deductible (home loan) debt into deductible (investment) debt if that will suit.
We tailor your investment strategy to you. Where money will not be needed for several years we use a ‘growth bucket’. Where money is needed for living expenses you must be conservative with reliable cashflow from an ‘income bucket’. You should always have an emergency cash reserve.
We have engaged InvestSense as our investment experts to provide you with modern, adaptable investment support. InvestSense specialise in portfolios for risk managed growth. We aim for a steady return above inflation and to avoid extreme market downturns.
Part of investing is considering tax and ownership arrangements, and managing liquidity. We work with your tax adviser to find the best mix of investment returns and tax outcomes. While tax is important, the viability of your investment is our main concern.
Annuities
miPlan has created a niche in annuity advice. Annuities are certain income streams where the client gives away control capital in return for reliable cashflows. We often use annuities as a capital security strategy and they work well to underpin a retirement lifestyle, or for shorter term savings goals.
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Aged Care & Estate Planning
Planning An Orderly Exit
No one likes thinking about the last part of their life, but it is important to plan an orderly exit. Estate planning, Centrelink, and aged care is complicated, and takes patience and persistence. We have created a niche in aged care advice, as we see this area as particularly challenging and under resourced.
We are amazed at the number of clients without wills and powers of attorney. These documents are one part of an estate and succession plan. We help you plan the orderly succession of your affairs and bring in expert legal advice if required.
The age care system is fraught with pitfalls, and changes make navigation difficult. We have the qualifications and experience to help you understand your options and make decisions sensitive to the needs of the care receiver and their family.
Anyone with a government support payment will tell you how challenging Centrelink can be. We can help you maximise your benefits and support your ongoing financial reporting. We can set up a nominee arrangement with Centrelink to remove the headache for you.
Steps To Consider Before Entering An Aged Care Home
If the need for residential aged care is nearing, following these five steps will help you make a smoother transition. Get your eligibility assessed, find a suitable facility, work out the cost, seek advice, and apply for an aged care home.
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Business & Personal Protection Plans
A Comprehensive Plan B
Your plan A quickly falls apart without a comprehensive Plan B. miPlan has a strong focus on recognising personal and business risk and deciding whether to reduce, remove or outsource that risk. What good is an investment portfolio if you have to sell it at a loss to pay for medical costs?
Bad things happen to good people, and we’ve seen the after effects. We’ve also seen situations where clients are so grateful that we persuaded them to put in place a plan B.
A simple cash reserves strategy will allow you see out short periods of illness or unemployment. It’s also there in case there’s a too-good-to-miss deal on a holiday. With this ability to self-insure for a few months, you can then protect a longer term problem through plans to find other suitable work, use family support, or to outsource the risk to an insurer with life, accident, illness and income insurances.
Unexpected illness or accident can be just as damaging to a business as a family. miPlan helps small business manage their succession and key person risk. Use Business Protection to Protect business succession, loan commitments as well as key people.
