Many Canadians want to pass on more than just assets, but they may need help doing so.designer491/iStockPhoto / Getty Images
Advisors can construct portfolios and develop tax strategies and estate plans to preserve wealth for the next generation, but that’s only part of a client’s legacy. Helping clients articulate and pass on the other part is a separate challenge.
“What people want to be their legacy isn’t defined by their money,” says Gary Teelucksingh, co-founder of the Money Wise Institute, a Toronto-based consulting firm focused on financial advice.
Mr. Teelucksingh has been thinking a lot about legacy. His book, Roots of Prosperity: Building Legacies Beyond Wealth, released last month, discusses the challenges of defining and passing on a legacy that goes beyond finances.
A recent survey from Edward Jones Canada shows that many Canadians want to pass on more than just assets, and may need help doing so. A lot of people have a hard time just thinking about and documenting what a legacy means, it found.
Mr. Teelucksingh says advisors have a role to play in uncovering that legacy. It’s not an easy thing to do.
Many clients will say things like, “‘In my family, that’s not the way it works,’” he says, or, “‘In my culture, that’s not the way it works.”
“There are a lot of people who aren’t comfortable having conversations that move into areas that are not clinical or numerical,” he adds – and that includes advisors. But these conversations build trust and add value.
The process can begin simply by asking clients why they’re building wealth and what they want it to become, he says, but also more general questions such as why they chose their profession, why they work so hard, and what’s important to them that isn’t principally defined by money.
Advisors can also help clients have family conversations that will clarify what legacy – or what part of them – they want passed on to their children.
“It could be rituals, it could be traditions, it could be values. All of those things will be synonymous with wealth, just not financial-only wealth,” he says.
In a country made up of immigrant families, Mr. Teelucksingh says many of those families don’t spend the time teaching their children about their experiences and sacrifices.
“I just think everyone has a story, and why would you want your story to be lost?” he says.
In addition to family conversations, some advisors are turning to third-party services that produce recordings and books to establish and pass on a client’s legacy.
Also, as Kira Vermond reported this week, some clients are choosing to pass on more of their wealth while they’re alive so they can shape their legacies and witness the impact, whether that’s enjoying a family vacation or helping an adult child buy a home.
- Mark Burgess, Globe Advisor assistant editor
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