Integrated Retirement Strategies (“IRS”) has offered financial planning and investment management services since 2007. Consumers have traditionally had three choices in managing their investment affairs:

 

• Hire a Registered Rep (aka a "Stockbroker");
• Hire a Financial Planner;
• Go it alone

 

 

 

Hire a stockbroker and any advice one receives is conflicted by commissions, sales loads, and fees that are all sources of revenue for the broker. Consumers have to ask themselves, “Is this advice the best for us? Or is this advice that is best for the broker? And what about our non-investment financial questions?”

 

Hire a traditional financial planner (many of whom are stockbrokers) and consumers may be served with a voluminous assessment of their investment prospects, complete with probability analyses which illustrate rates of return as well as the likelihood of outliving their nest eggs. For this, consumers may pay a large fee ($5,000 is not uncommon) for the plan and ongoing fees/commissions.

 

Going it alone entails gathering all the knowledge and expertise of the stockbroker and financial planner, without having the luxury of someone to blame in the event the future underperforms the plan. For some, this is a welcome challenge. For others - well, it’s the reason they hired a professional!

 

IRS offers you another choice. Unlike stockbrokers, IRS will seek investment results using low-cost products like index mutual funds and exchange-traded funds (ETFs). Careful attention will always be paid to expense ratios and trading and administration costs. Unlike many financial planners, IRS will help you not only address your investments, but other issues like protection, cash management, and budgeting. IRS will also help you address your estate planning, tax advice, and administration needs. In short, IRS seeks to become your trusted advisor, coordinating all your financial professionals to develop solutions tailored to your needs. Feel free to review our latest Form ADV Part 2. Additional information about IRS is also available on the SEC's website.