Latest / Financial Planner Search / The Heart of Financial Advice with Travis & Liana Poodiack | Financial Planner Search
Transcript
- Gregory Wilnau: All right, Leanna and Travis, it's great to talk to you guys today. How are you doing? Liana Poodiack: We're doing great. Nice to talk to you, Greg. Travis : Yes, I am wonderful. Gregory Wilnau: You too. I'm super excited. Okay, so you guys are a mother and son team. ⁓ You run your firm together. ⁓ Maybe you could quickly just talk about, Liana, how you started the firm and Travis, how you're a part of it. Maybe you could just share us more about, share with us more about your firm and kind of what you guys do. Liana Poodiack: That's correct. Sure. Well, I've been a financial advisor for a little over 25 years. ⁓ I think what got me started in the business is my own enjoyment out of investing for myself. ⁓ And then also that desire to help people, help individuals understand their own situations and help. you know, educate them. So to a lot of degree, I kind of see myself as as an educator. ⁓ And I truly enjoy getting to know my clients. Many of our clients have been with me for over 20 years, along with their children and grandchildren. So not only are we a multi generational team, our clients are generally multi generational as well. Gregory Wilnau: Yeah, so there's a lot of continuity there. So Travis, what's it like going to work for your mom? Liana Poodiack: there. Travis : Um, that's a kind of normal. Um, uh, I've been, uh, we've worked together for, oh gosh, going on. will be the 11th year, uh, full time, uh, together. Um, I'd say the, the, most difficult part was, that like first three, four months, uh, right out of college, still living at home. And we were like commuting together. Uh, like it was. Gregory Wilnau: Congrats, that's awesome. Travis : 24 hours nonstop and I'm like, no, need to go find my own place. This is a little too much. But no, it's been wonderful. I think we have great chemistry. ⁓ It's been amazing to get the opportunity to work ⁓ so closely with my mother. And I think the clients, ⁓ I think it's resonated with the clients. ⁓ Gregory Wilnau: Yeah, yeah. Well, it sounds like it because a lot of your clients are multi-generational too. So you're kind of eating your own dog food, so to speak. Liana Poodiack: Yeah, that's correct. Mm-hmm. Travis : Yeah, yeah. Or even like our business owner clients, ⁓ a lot of family owned businesses. ⁓ So it's been interesting to just kind of see ⁓ the overlap between our kind of business, our clients' businesses. So yeah, very enjoyable. Liana Poodiack: And Travis, I mean, Travis grew up around, you know, me working with my clients when ⁓ Hannah's brother were young, a lot of times they would, you know, come with me to some of those in-home meetings or things like that, just because of, you know, we were on our way back from daycare or things like that. So they kind of grew up around the importance of my clients and working with them and kind of meeting them on their terms. Gregory Wilnau: I love that. Okay, so I know that everybody has their own unique way of working with their clients. What are some of the things that you do, Neanna, that you might have passed on to Travis that your clients have said they really appreciate about how you approach working with them? Does that question make sense? Liana Poodiack: Yeah, now that makes sense, Greg. I think for me, working with clients and I think what Travis has garnered from that is the importance of developing initially that relationship, getting to really understand who they are as an individual and what's important to them and their family. Because there's many aspects of you know, being a financial advisor and as a financial advisor, you can, you can choose to just go down the path of just concentrating on investments, or you can choose to go down a path of concentrating on the individual person and the family and all the different things that impact them or that they may have to make decisions around, whether it's in regards to their investments or something completely different. ⁓ So a lot of times, You know, not only are we coaching them from a financial perspective, but it can be, you know, in regards to sometimes it's family situations, you know, they may have something going on in the family. And although we are not counselors or things like that, just having that other ear to listen to. And then we may have experienced something with a different family or a similar situation and maybe can point them in the right direction of where they may be able to go for help. So I think it's important to understand each individual client and family. Gregory Wilnau: I love that. What are some of the ways that you do that uniquely that people might not expect? I'd like Travis to maybe answer that question and then Leanna, maybe if you could. What's way that you've gone above and beyond or a special way that you've gotten to know a client that they might not? Travis : Yeah, I mean, I think, I mean, it really starts at the beginning of like any relationship is just taking like a true genuine interest in this person as an individual. I think our industry or profession ⁓ can get a bad rap, if you will, ⁓ where a lot of times someone will come to us with maybe ⁓ preconceived notions or opinions. I'm kind of, you know, what an advisor actually is or what they do. And I think in very short order, even in the span of like an initial conversation, I think we put a lot of those, you know, we proved those wrong. ⁓ Not to say that other, you know, other advisors don't do that, but I think, you know, our approach is unique. Gregory Wilnau: I love that. Liana, what are some of the ways that you think that you guys do that? When a client first comes to you, they first meet you, they have those preconceived notions, which of course is natural. What are some of the ways that you think maybe when you first meet them, some of those, maybe those barriers or those kind of drops? Liana Poodiack: Yeah, I think our process also helps put the clients at ease. mean, initially, if somebody is reaching out to us through our website or they're getting a direct referral from one of our clients, which is where a lot of our clients come from, is referrals from existing clients. ⁓ That initial conversation is just a quick 10 minute conversation, getting a little bit of information about what's going on in their life at that moment. And why do they feel they're at that stage where they want to work with somebody. And then from that, if they, you if we have that initial connection, because sometimes from that initial conversation, you can tell if there's a connection there or not. And then our next meeting is more of our get to know you meeting. Gregory Wilnau: Mm. Liana Poodiack: they'll either come into the office or will schedule, you know, a Google Meet or Zoom meeting and dive a little deeper into them as individuals. You know, kind of where they are in their life, what they have going on. We'll get into some general information in regards to, you know, their financial situation, their estate and situation. But just overall really put it out there in regards to them and not about us trying to sell them. Like we don't sell products. You know, we're not there saying, ⁓ go buy this or do this. We're there about figuring out what they need. And then we're going to come to them with our recommendations and our solutions. So we're kind of looking at it from the perspective that we're selling our overall, you know, ⁓ How do I want to say it? We're selling ourselves, you know, as being there as their guide, as their guide to go through life, basically. Gregory Wilnau: Yeah, the relationship. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I love that. So let me swing it back to Travis really quick, because you mentioned ⁓ certain situations that come up. But what are some of the certain situations that come up with your clients that you enjoy working on specifically? Like, what do you enjoy working on the most? Travis : Yeah, no, great question. I think, you know, everyone for me, you know, retirement, ⁓ that can always be like a interesting time period in someone's life to work through. ⁓ don't like ⁓ that's I would say not my favorites. ⁓ Oftentimes, well, because, you know, like kind of everyone goes through it. So in some ways it Gregory Wilnau: Why not? Travis : It looks very similar. ⁓ I think some of the most challenging or rewarding, ⁓ interactions, ⁓ from the standpoint of me being an advisor and working through someone is oftentimes those, unforeseen events, they oftentimes are negative in nature and carry a lot of emotions. So whether that's Gregory Wilnau: Mm-hmm. Travis : you know, something as drastic as like a unforeseen death or, ⁓ you know, some type of, you know, other, maybe similar event. I think in those types of situations, ⁓ because of, think the approach that we take with our clients where it is a very deep, ⁓ and true meaningful relationship, we're able to kind of not only work through those financial kind of aspects. but also connect ⁓ as it relates to those emotional aspects. ⁓ Because oftentimes those are very intertwined ⁓ that you don't necessarily see with retirement. Retirement's like, ⁓ yeah, cool. ⁓ There's some emotion attached to it, but it's ⁓ different. ⁓ Gregory Wilnau: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, so retirement is kind of like a track you move on, but there are these moments along that path and handling those within the broader context of that path to align your client with that is stuff you like. Liana Poodiack: Yeah. Travis : Yeah, would kind of call them those like critical financial and life events. Like the things that we know can happen, they don't happen per se to everyone, but when they do, ⁓ you know, having someone that understands you and your situation and has the experience to kind of help you navigate through that, you know, from start to finish, I think leads to... better outcomes, better emotions, just ⁓ kind of guiding someone through and someone says like the most difficult thing they're ever gonna go through. ⁓ Liana Poodiack: I was just gonna add that, you know, some of our, you know, one of the things that we also ⁓ encourage when we're working with our clients, ⁓ you know, you have individual clients, but then with our couples, it's very important to us to have those meetings, at least one of those meetings once a year with both people. Because sometimes what happens in relationships is that you have one main person that deals with all the financial stuff and the other person, you know, may or may not be interested in, you know, understanding the financial stuff, but might just not be as comfortable. So they don't want to go to the meetings. And what's important to us is that both people attend because we want that other person to be comfortable with who we are and understand that we're there to help them. So one of our clients Gregory Wilnau: Yeah. Liana Poodiack: And there are several different that are similar or that you know, I worked with the husband He was the one that I had worked with for several years They kind of had things in different places, but it was always kind of you know, we were compartmentalized and I worked with Right I had never Right. I had my wife. I had never met the wife. He told me she just didn't deal with it Gregory Wilnau: Yeah. So probably bringing the spouses together helps have conversations that they might not have had before. Yeah. Travis : Exactly. Liana Poodiack: She dealt with certain things within the household, but that all the finances was stuff that he did. And they were older. And I explained to him, said, I can understand that. And they happened to be friends with the other advisor. But anyway, I encouraged him. said, well, what I would like is for you to bring her to our next meeting so that she can meet me. So that if something unexpected happens, and I usually use the term if you were to get hit by a bus, ⁓ You know, I want her to be comfortable that she can call and understand that we're here to help her. Well, he did bring her in. And initially I was like thinking, yeah, you know, I'm going to meet her and that's going to be fine. But she saw how genuine we were and we are. ⁓ And she actually encouraged him to consolidate their stuff with me so that she didn't have to be going all over town. to deal with all their issues at some point in the future. And he has since passed away. ⁓ fortunately, we had brought everything in. I met with the family ⁓ shortly after her husband passed away. And that relationship was cemented because of how comfortable she felt with us. And she's told us on several occasions, had she not had that connection with us, she would have been overwhelmed, but she felt very comfortable in that she knew that we were there to help her ⁓ with whatever came along and her children feel the same way as well. So that's just, you know, one example of, you know, an older couple and the importance for us to have clients feel comfortable that they can come to us with any kind of situation and we're gonna listen, we're gonna try to help. Gregory Wilnau: Yeah. Liana Poodiack: point them in the right direction if it's not something that we can directly help them with. Gregory Wilnau: Man, I tell you that resonates with me. my old man died a couple of years ago, mom, they didn't have any professional helping them. And my mom had to navigate that through all by herself. So having somebody that could be a solid rock for you to help you work through that would have been really nice. It's really nice. okay, so this. Liana Poodiack: Mm-hmm. Yep. I mean, it's over. You know, and that's the last thing you want to do when you're having to navigate, you know, just dealing with this huge loss and not knowing where's our money going to come from, you know, or, you know, for this person, it was like, the husband was the one that paid most of the bills. You know, she dealt with, you know, certain things. It was just the whole thing was overwhelming. And we just helped guide, guide her all along the way. So, and we do that for everybody. know, Travis works a lot with younger clients who are fresh out of college and, you know, dealing with some of those things or that, you know, first time, you know, you've got somebody that's leaving a job and they've got a role, a generational, more of a generation. Gregory Wilnau: So this would be like maybe the, okay, yeah, all right, that's great. Man, I could see how that would be so valuable to have the two of you ⁓ on, working with the same family, but with different generations. I could see that. Okay, so we've talked about some people who come to you, maybe they're married, ⁓ they haven't been aligned on finances, retirement's coming, and they get the benefit of doing that. But Travis, tell me about maybe another kind of person or another type of situation that people typically will come to you with that makes them reach out. Travis : Yeah. mean, retirement is obviously, I would say one of the most common, it's usually, you know, I would say when that person probably is, you know, in their early fifties, you know, they're well established in their career. Kids are out of the houses, but they have kids, et cetera. ⁓ and they start actually like thinking a little bit down the road and then they're, you know, questions start arising, ⁓ you know, and they start, for a lot of people, they're like, hey, like, how do I find a professional to help me sort through these things? I'd say that's a very common one. ⁓ You know, other ones kind of that we spoke on a little ⁓ earlier in a different way, know, unexpected events. So inheritance, ⁓ you know, death in the family, ⁓ job loss. Liana Poodiack: job law. Travis : you know, it can be common ones or like. There were, know, like, Hey, I have this awesome opportunity with a career change, you know, with all of this, ⁓ you know, new potential that, wasn't there before. it's complicated. And there's a lot of things that I don't understand. You know, ⁓ we've had those over the years, ⁓ with, you know, people that are not in their fifties, you know, we're talking, you know, people in their early thirties, you know, that are. very busy, you know, in that high, high pace career, navigating a lot of those things. So I'd say it spans a wide range. And that's, think kind of, ⁓ I don't want say unique to our practice, but I'd say just because we do, you we don't just focus truly on like, Hey, you know, I only work with someone who's 62 years old and is going to retire in two years. ⁓ I like to say we're fortunate that we've built ⁓ a business where we're able to work with, you know, those younger individuals. ⁓ it's something that's important to me because, you know, I'm part of that generation. it's like, like I'm doing things for myself. you if I'm able to, you know, provide benefit to, you know, other individuals that are looking for those services, then it's like, okay, cool. ⁓ Gregory Wilnau: Yeah. Sounds like legacy is something that's important to you and your clients. So tell me about maybe a client that, I don't want to say a client, a potential client that you turned away, but tell me ⁓ somebody who might not be the best fit to work with you guys. Liana Poodiack: Definitely. Travis : ⁓ for sure. Yeah, I would say, well, so we do. ⁓ We've implemented this for. Gosh, probably the last seven, eight years we have in us is what we kind of call a fit process where, you know, we're not trying to work with every single individual, you know, in the world, we, you know, we want there to be an alignment, you know, kind of a mutual fit ⁓ because our relationships. you know, last a very long time. And a lot of instances. Exactly. ⁓ So, you know, we want to make sure there is that mutual alignment. And sometimes, you know, oftentimes there is where we will enter into that, ⁓ you know, arrangement relationship. But oftentimes there's not, whether it's, you know, they don't think we're a fit for them, or we don't think we're a fit for what they're looking for. ⁓ Gregory Wilnau: generationally, Travis : I wouldn't say there's like a particular like client avatar of who's not a fit. think the one overlapping thing that I've seen over the years is, ⁓ and some of it's just, you know, the type of clients that we would like to work with is there needs to be a willingness to listen and take, ⁓ you know, someone's advice. And for some types of people, Gregory Wilnau: mutual trust. Travis : ⁓ that's very hard for them to do. ⁓ And oftentimes those are the relationships that are not a fit for us. Or it's like, well, if we're gonna spend all this time together and try and work through these things, but someone's doing the complete opposite of what we're recommending or what have you. And it's like, well, why are we in this relationship? ⁓ Liana Poodiack: Why are we, yep, exactly. Gregory Wilnau: Yeah. Anything you want to add to that, Liana? Liana Poodiack: ⁓ I would just say that, you know, one thing I would say about my practice and it, doesn't happen as much nowadays and maybe because, our process weeds them out. But I remember when I was a younger advisor, you know, I would have somebody come in and, ⁓ you know, they were, you could tell they were just a day trade. They were like looking at their thing multiple times a day and looking at what the price of something was and. wanting to make a change or do something, that's not our practice. Our practice is built around more of a longer term approach. Not that there aren't things that we change in portfolios and things like that, but it's like, we want somebody to understand ⁓ the overall process and not get emotional about what's going on today in the market. Gregory Wilnau: Mm. Liana Poodiack: You know, that's part of our thing is to help clients get through the emotional part of investing because it is very emotional for individuals, especially, you know, whether they're very knowledgeable or not knowledgeable, it can still be very emotional. so like Travis was saying, we want somebody to, you know, work with us that's going to sit there, have conversations with us that are Gregory Wilnau: Mmm. Liana Poodiack: real conversations, not just saying something because they think that's what we want to hear. We want to truly understand how do they feel about the market and when they see the market go up or down and how impactful is that to them? ⁓ And we want to help guide them through that and help them understand that. So there have been a few clients over the years that initially got through a screening process and I felt Gregory Wilnau: Do you? Liana Poodiack: you know that you know they were investors but it turned out after about you know nine to twelve months I realized that you know they didn't have one of them it was a couple one of yeah did not have the emotional ability to not look at things every day and and regardless of what we would say we'll just do something the opposite and finally we just said hey this just is not working you are not an investor Travis : longer a fib. Gregory Wilnau: Hmm. Liana Poodiack: you need to kind of be over here because that's not a right fit. Gregory Wilnau: Well, at least through that process, you were able to guide him through. But do you guys think that your focus on a long-term relationship, really getting to know people and working with them over a longer period of time gives you the ability to have a better intuition for how to make recommendations to that individual and how to phrase things or say things in a way that helps them feel more confident? Liana Poodiack: Yes. Exactly. Travis : ⁓ for sure. I mean, we have... Yeah, I mean, you learn, well, not quickly. ⁓ But you know, like, on average, mean, our relationships last probably, if you looked at the entire client base, I mean, it's probably 15, 20 years, it's probably even longer than that. I haven't actually done the math. ⁓ So I mean, you learn, you know, like, hey, you know, Bob really loves diving deep and you know, Liana Poodiack: Some of my clients have been. Travis : you know, give him the bullet points and that's how he makes, you know, a decision. ⁓ or, know, Gregory Wilnau: So keep it high level, avoid the details. Yeah. Liana Poodiack: Mm-hmm. Yep, you have all different kinds of you know when you want to over And you like Travis : Yeah. ⁓ Gregory Wilnau: If somebody might want more details, yeah. I love that. Travis : Exactly. think overall at a broad level, think the types of clients that work with a professional advisor, at least someone who's, not, you know, we, we focus very heavily on kind of that life planning is, ⁓ you know, they want that high level, ⁓ you know, kind of overview of like, well, Hey, like, why should we be doing this? ⁓ We don't have a lot of clients that, you know, really need to like dive under the hood and wants to understand like every single element of how we formed that recommendation. ⁓ if they do, we can walk them through it. ⁓ so it's more just like establishing that trust and then having consistent communications with our clients so that we understand. Liana Poodiack: Mm-hmm. Travis : what's going on in their lives. They understand kind of what's going on in the markets or like just all of the stuff that happens throughout a year. ⁓ And then that can uncover ⁓ situations where we have a conversation. look under the hood, present our findings, and then it's always the client's decision of what they want to do. ⁓ but we'll always point them in what we feel is in their best interest. ⁓ And oftentimes it can be a very just simple conversation with some clients. And then for other clients, it's multiple meetings, let's dive under the hood, let's peel back the layers of the onion. And I have no preference one way or another. I enjoy both of those conversations. So it's. Gregory Wilnau: Absolutely. Sure. depends on what they need. Yeah. That's the benefit of getting to know them. Okay, Leon, I got a question for you. Put your humble hat on. It's hard to do this. All right. But put your humble hat on. What's something you do for clients that takes a significant amount of time, but that they'll never know? Liana Poodiack: Thanks. Gregory Wilnau: time, energy, effort, thought. brag about yourself for a little bit here. Liana Poodiack: Well, I guess for me, I am one of those kind of people that I have to know. I'm a sponge. Like I want to know information and understand information. So when clients tell me different situations, whether it's a health related or different things that night, I'm probably going home and I'm looking to see what that particular illness or whatever is going on in their life, I'm going to freshen up on what that means and what they potentially are going to be going through. Because I want to understand, you know, what's going on in my client's lives. You know, if they're going in for, you know, a bypass surgery or a knee replacement or a hip replacement, I want to understand those things. So I am a sponge from that perspective. And so when I'm talking with my clients after ⁓ you know, I have knowledge about what they're going through and, ⁓ can talk about, know, how important therapy is after you have a hip replacement. And that's one of the main things, you know, you're going to power through it and, and all of that. And I don't, a lot of my clients, you know, they will. I remember one of my first, ⁓ stories and I think it kind of started from this one particular client of why I started. Gregory Wilnau: More context, more understanding. Liana Poodiack: feeling like I had to understand what they were going through. ⁓ I was a brand new advisor ⁓ and I was meeting with one of my partner's older clients who had had prostate surgery. And I'm probably 30 years old and I'm sitting across from this gentleman and he's explaining the whole surgery to me and I'm sitting there like, ⁓ my God, you know, I had no idea. My partner. Gregory Wilnau: Yeah. Liana Poodiack: who was older and they were somewhat friends or they knew each other, acquaintances, walks in my office, starts hearing him telling me what he was going through. He literally walked out of my office. So I was like, I didn't want to be shocked. I, one of those people, I can compose myself and Gregory Wilnau: turns right back around. Ooh, I'll let you handle that one. Whoa. Liana Poodiack: You know, my client probably never knew that I was a little bit uncomfortable ⁓ with that conversation. But from that, always wanted to know what was going on in their life and so that they could feel comfortable telling us anything. And our clients will tell us pretty much what is going on, you know, or... Gregory Wilnau: I think that's a great example. I think that's a great. Liana Poodiack: calling a client and the client feeling comfortable and the wife's like, well, he's in the shower right now, just a moment. And I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, And I think that's, you know, extremely, you know, important to me. And I know what's important to Travis as he works with our clients. ⁓ And it's just something that over the years working with different advisors, don't, they don't take at least the ones that I've worked with, some have, you know, taken the approach, but going that extra distance, I mean, there's a lot of clients that we meet with in person at their homes. Not because they can't drive into our office, just because we want to make it convenient for them or once in a while we want to see them in their own environment. ⁓ So that's what I enjoy about clients. And those are some of the things that I do that they probably don't know why I stay up till midnight or something researching something that they may have mentioned to me or. They're having an issue with some plants in their yard. it's like, I can pretty much talk about anything. I mean, I can talk about equipment with my business owners. can ⁓ pretty much talk about anything ⁓ because I'm just trying to that knowledge. Gregory Wilnau: think that's what you'd want when you have an advisor. You want to feel comfortable. Liana Poodiack: Exactly. I want to be able to talk about things that are important to them and kind of understand it. So that's. Gregory Wilnau: I love it. Travis, for someone listening who is interested in learning more about you and possibly working with you, what should they do next? How can they learn more about you? Travis : I think, yeah, I think easiest way to learn more about us is go to our website, birchfinancialgroup.com. ⁓ Spend a lot of time putting a lot of effort into it, ⁓ so people can get a better understanding of who we are, who we work with, ⁓ what our process is. ⁓ Or pick up the phone, call us, send us an email. walk into our office. mean, we, you know, we're not particular. We'll have a conversation with anyone. You know, we don't. Liana Poodiack: The has a link so that they can reach out to us that way and that link will come in and ⁓ ask them a few questions and then we'll reach out. Gregory Wilnau: We'll also put links in the show notes below the episode for anybody who's watching who wants to get in touch. All right, Leanna and Travis, thank you so much for taking the time. Really enjoyed it. Liana Poodiack: You're welcome, Greg. You have a great afternoon. Take care. Thank you. Travis : Thank you, Greg. Gregory Wilnau: you as well.