Approved IAR CE Courses

Getting clients to talk about end-of-life planning can be a tricky proposition, with clients often distracting, delaying, and denying their way to avoidance. Financial planners know that end-of-life planning can protect a client's family and assets for an inevitable future where they are no longer able to do so themselves. So, what is an advisor to do?Drawing on Terror Management Theory and extensive experimental research, Dr. Russell James explains the psychological effects of personal mortality salience on behavior and preferences. He then explains why this leads people to want to solve their death problem with avoidance or by seeking symbolic immortality through lasting social impact. Throughout the presentation, Russell highlights how advisors can work with, not against, these human traits by leveraging framing, language, and social norms to better guide clients through sensitive mortality-related decisions and improve engagement.

In this continuing education session, the learner will read 4 articles from the Nerd's Eye View blog: The Problem Of High U.S. Equity Valuations And How Advisors Can Factor In Current Evaluations Risks, Why Moving To A Lower-Tax State Doesn't Always Result In Lower State Taxes On Deferred Income, How Communicating Guardrails Withdrawal Strategies Can Improve Client Experience And Decrease Stress, and Why Guyton-Klinger Guardrails Are Too Risky For Most Retirees (And How Risk-Based Guardrails Can Help). Each of the 4 articles will discuss important aspects of retirement planning through the lens of investing and tax planning. In The Problem Of High U.S. Equity Valuations And How Advisors Can Factor In Current Evaluations Risks, Larry Swedroe, Head of Financial and Economic Research for Buckingham Strategic Wealth, explains how advisors can create more reasonable return assumptions for long-term financial planning. Swedroe explains the factors that have led to the high average equity returns from the last decade, why these high U.S. equity returns are not likely to continue into the future, and how to account for these high U.S. equity valuations in investment portfolios. In Why Moving To A Lower-Tax State Doesn't Always Result In Lower State Taxes On Deferred Income, Ben Henry-Moreland explains state taxation for deferred compensation and how to factor in state tax laws when relocating to minimize taxation on future retirement income. Derek Tharp is featured in 2 articles this month: How Communicating Guardrails Withdrawal Strategies Can Improve Client Experience And Decrease Stress and Why Guyton-Klinger Guardrails Are Too Risky For Most Retirees (co-authored by Justin Fitzpatrick). He explains the importance of explaining withdrawal guardrails to clients to reduce stress and provide clarity on how to cope with economic downturns in retirement. In the second article on retirement guardrails, the authors explain the strengths and weaknesses of the Guyton-Klinger guardrail method and explain how risk-based guardrails can be used to better manage retirement income risk.

In this continuing education session, we will review 3 articles on client communication in financial planning client engagements. In the first article, '3 Question Types To Go From (Just) Retained To Highly Engaged And Happier Clients,' Meghaan Lurtz, PhD, FBS details research on client engagement and opportunities for advisors to engage clients proactively. In the second article, 'Reframing Risk In Retirement As 'Over- And Under-Spending' To Better Communicate Decisions To Clients, And Finding 'Best Guess' Spending Level,' Justin Fitzpatrick, PhD, CFP, CFA explains how the success/failure framing of Monte Carlo analysis can cause clients to focus on the possibility of failure and how to consider reframing retirement income discussion into a framing of overspending or underspending. Fitzpatrick further discusses how advisors can help clients determine a balanced spending level. In the third article of this series, '5 Questions Using Risk Assessment Data That Help Advisors Understand Clients' True Concerns About Risk,' Meghaan Lurtz walks advisors through transforming the collection of risk tolerance data from clients into risk conversations to help advisors more precisely understand how clients are impacted by risk and how to best serve them.

In this course, financial advisors can learn about in-depth life insurance policy review and then practice with realistic examples of life insurance documents and client scenarios. This course covers a general overview of the life insurance landscape and delves into the intricacies of reviewing term life insurance and 4 types of permanent life insurance. In each module, advisors can practice document reviews and answer knowledge reinforcement questions to help solidify the concepts. The course concludes with a capstone assessment for continuing education.

Financial planners can learn an immense amount of information about a client's circumstances by reviewing an individual income tax return. However, the reality is that the complexity of a tax return doesn't conform neatly to typical income tax planning strategies. In this whitepaperclass, we look, schedule-by-schedule as well as line-by-line to address key parts of an individual income tax return. Advisors will learn which schedules, lines, and sections should commonly be reviewed, as well as the sorts of critical information and tax planning strategies (or potential tax problems) that can be identified by reviewing a tax return.

While retirement-income guardrails offer a convenient and easy-to-understand framework foradvisors to explain when a client would need to make portfolio adjustments to facilitate spendingduring retirement, certain guardrail models come with major limitations. For example, withdrawalrate guardrails are a commonly used framework, but they do not always accurately reflect a client'sdynamic income sources and actual spending behaviors. Risk-based retirement-guardrails, on theother hand, have the benefits of communication and clarity, while modeling a client's retirementincome sources and spending patterns more realistically.

In this continuing education session, we review two blog articles: How To Register And Remain Registered With The SEC As An Internet Investment Adviser and DoL's Retirement Security Rule & PTE 2020-02 Amendment: What Advisers Need to Know Now About Giving Rollover Advice After Sept 23, 2024. In the first article, Chris Stanley explains the history of the Internet Adviser Exemption as a pathway to SEC registration and reviews the 2024 amendments to the rule. In the second article, Jacqueline Hummel reviews upcoming changes to the fiduciary standards for advisors providing investment advice to retirement investors under the final version of the Department of Labor's Retirement Security Rule.

You asked the clients for their estate planning documents, and they gave you 62 pages of Wills and trusts. As a financial advisor, you're expected to review the documents to help them understand whether their estate plan aligns with their goals. But it can take hours and hours to read through lengthy documents and translate legalese to English and provide recommendations. However, most estate planning documents have common elements that provide the core information that advisors need to know, and learning them provides a shortcut that allows advisors to review documents more quickly and spot the key issues.

In this continuing education session, we review 2 articles from the Nerd Eye's View: Inspired Discovery: Asking Vision Questions to Focus on Clients' "Ideal Self" and 'ReFire' Instead Of 'Just' Retire: A Framework To Help Clients Plan For Purpose In Retirement. In the first article, Kathleen illustrates how retirement can be reframed not as an end, but as a phase of life centered on fulfillment, self-exploration, and purpose. In the second article, Meghaan Lurtz explains how advisors can restructure discovery meetings to start with vision-oriented questions that encourage ideal-self conversations, moving the meeting from a technical discussion to one that is more inspiring and meaningful for clients.