Monday, July 10, 2006 Planning financial futures becomes 'a pleasure' Denise Wilcox's commission-free firm hits home run with clients BY VALERIE MILLER BUSINESS PRESS Financial planner Denise Wilcox is able to turn potential clients into long-term ones because she learned early in her career that no one likes a hard sell. Since opening Wilcox Advisors a year ago after toiling 15 years as a broker, her no-commission, fee-only business has proved to be a successful one. Instead of churning and burning clientele, Wilcox is now able to feel better about her work, knowing that she doesn't have any vested interest in anything but doing the proper planning for her clients. "The reason I opened my own firm is I became disenchanted with the way others do business. Most financial planners do commissionable business," Wilcox said She did both fee and commission business during her years as a financial planner and broker with Las Vegas-based Independent Planning Associates. She maintained that she did the right thing by her clients at the company, but just didn't like the concept of acting as both a broker and adviser. "I am fee-based, like a doctor or a lawyer. I don't have any conflicts of interest," she said. Denise Wilcox sleeps easier at night after she opened a commission-free financial advisory agency. Giving up commission deals is not easy for a start-up financial firm, Wilcox admitted. Much of the revenue comes from pushing others' products. After start-up costs of approximately $15,000, the company is generating upwards of $6,000 a month in revenues. Although Wilcox has no doubts that the figure would be higher with commission sales, she has no regrets. "I'm 52 and I'm comfortable and I am not as driven by making as much money as I was when I was younger," she professed. "I don't care about making a half a million a year." COMPETITION-LESS FIELD On the plus side, the market isn't as fierce as it is for financial advisers who dabble in commission business as well. "Because there are only a handful of fee-only advisor firms, to me, I don't see the competition. I don't feel it." Wilcox Advisors gets to know its clients, sometimes better than even their family, according to Wilcox, who is the only financial adviser in her company and plans on keeping her client list in the manageable 50 to 60 range. Currently, she has 21. Right now, her client roster gives her time to sit down and figure out their needs. An assessment is done first. If the client wants promises of returns on specific investments, Wilcox said that that's a bad sign and might turn them away. "Nobody should make them those guarantees. There are no guarantees in life, especially not in investments." If the potential client just needs a financial road map, Wilcox begins to work on their asset allocation and design a portfolio for their needs. She looks at what their money is being used for. College funds are set up, along with estate plans. An annual assessment of retirement plans is also provided for customers. Charges can range from anywhere from $150 an hour to a flat rate of a couple thousand depending on the service. Often, the services provided by Wilcox are common sense. "Sometimes it is couple getting to know each other's spending habits better." START WITH A BUDGET How many people lack a budget? "Everybody!" she responded, laughing. "You are planning their money. We go through where their needs are. It's like going to Weight Watchers. Sometime you just need goals. You need structure." Many financial advisers require clients to have a minimum of $100,000 in assets before they'll work with them. Wilcox doesn't do that. "If you don't have any assets, we need to decide how we can get them." Being a financial adviser wasn't exactly in Wilcox's plans when she was growing up in Salt Lake City. Health care was her first calling. As part of that process, Wilcox, then 18, was the youngest person ever to be a ward clerk of the newborn intensive care unit at the University of Utah Medical Center. Then the love bug struck; she married and started a family. That shift took her through a diverse career path that lead her into the financial end of the health care field. This time it was doing medical billing. There, she gained knowledge of financial planning for health-care issues. A couple years as a tax preparer at H&R Block helped her understanding of finance and accounting. By the late 1980s, Wilcox was working with teachers in Salt Lake City on investing in their retiremen plans after obtaining her securities license. Wilcox moved to Las Vegas in 1990 and became licensed to sell insurance. Although she never became a nurse, Wilcox maintained she is doing something equally important. "Now, instead of helping people get better physically, I am their financial doctor." From other professionals that may seem like a clever ad slogan, but Wilcox has seen the importance of financial planning first hand. "I lost my father suddenly when I was 14, and my mother was not able to function well financially,"Wilcox recalled. "Every person, whether married or single, needs to know where all the financial documents are. I thought my mom should have been more involved in the financial process." Today, Wilcox is just enjoying running her own financial operations. "I am not beholden to anyone. My only commitment is to my clients. It's a wonderful feeling. I don't know why I didn't do this 20 years ago." vmiller@lvbusinesspress.com | 702-871-6780 x331 PROFILE FACTS Company: Wilcox Advisors, Inc. Owner: Denise Wilcox Address: 1489 W. Warm Springs Road, Ste. 110, Henderson, NV 89014 Year founded locally: 2005 Phone number: 702-939-4920 Web site: www.wilcoxadvisors.com Copyright © 2006, Las Vegas Business Press