Article title image: What I learned in 2023

What I Learned in 2023

Dear Reader, Looking forward, I am an optimist. Looking back, I am a historian. It’s what I am in the present that has helped me become a better investor: Unemotional. For investors, the last four years have been historic…and exhausting. We had the fastest recession, fastest recovery, fastest inflation, and the fastest interest rates. Not […]

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There’s Something Good Waiting Down This Road

I started my career as an advisor the old-fashioned way: With a telephone and a list of numbers. Cold calling was the way to find clients for decades on Wall Street. But in the ‘Do Not Call’ days of 2006, the path to success was not the same. Still, each day I had a piece […]

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Fumbling the Handoff

I am happy to report we are in the final stages of our patio/yard project at the Morton house! On Monday evening, Gina told me the landscapers had come out to start planting grass seed. My immediate thought was: “Uh oh…I don’t have any sprinklers!” So, I raced to Home Depot at 7:30 pm to […]

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Defining Greatness - Aggressive Balance Newsletter with Dennis Morton

Defining Greatness

As we approach Super Bowl Weekend, I’ve been thinking about the characteristics of the teams, players, and leaders who make it to the peak of their sport. Eleanor Roosevelt once said, “Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, small minds discuss people.” Greatness as a function of where we focus attention got me thinking […]

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financial advisor influence

Financial Advisor Influence and Optimism

The best prediction that I ever made was not a prediction at all. It was more of an observation. In the summer of 2019, I wrote about The Good Old Days and presented this idea: What if these are the days you will look back on and say “Remember when…?” As it turned out, compared […]

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couple looking at personal finances

Narrowing The Field of Personal Finances

In today’s world, developing expertise in our personal finances doesn’t mean trying to become experts in every market-related data point. That will only add to our confusion. No, the expertise we seek is about how changes in the world around us affect our unique decisions about money. “How wonderful that we have met with a […]

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woman looking at hiring a financial advisor

9 Advantages of Hiring a Financial Advisor

Did you know that the financial planning and advisory market is worth $59.2 billion in the US alone? This is not surprising as more people are genuinely concerned about their financial future. However, many people still don’t realize the importance of hiring a financial advisor. Handling financial matters can get complicated, especially as you approach important life […]

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couple completing Return on Life survey

Calculating Your Return On Life

So often our money conversations are black and white. How much do I have? Are my investments up or down? Do I have enough? But, enough for what? As financial advisors, we often challenge the traditional money conversation. We help to expand it beyond thinking in terms of return on investment, rather encouraging our clients […]

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Cody Demmel

Becoming A Financial Advisor: My Origin Story

My path to becoming a financial advisor has not been a smooth one. However, it has afforded me life lessons that fuel my passion and the work I do for my clients. I have been challenged by my colleagues to author my origin story as a means of sharing those lessons as well as providing […]

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