Do Your Advisors Have The Eye Of The Tiger?

"It's the eye of the tiger
It's the thrill of the fight
Rising up to the challenge of our rival
And the last known survivor
Stalks his prey in the night
And he's watching us all with the eye of the tiger"
Eye of the Tiger by Survivor. #1 Hit 1982

It's The Little Things That Can Get You
In the wild, being aware of the little things can make the difference between life and death, feast or famine. The predator has to use stealth, surprise, speed and quickness when pursuing its prey. One little sound or even approaching from the wrong wind direction can lead to failure and an empty stomach.

In life, it's also the little things that can trip us up and cause unintended consequences. A surgeon does a fantastic job performing a surgery. The surgery is successful. But what happens if someone in housekeeping didn't do their job, or someone in food service? They didn't handwash properly? The patient could end up with a MRSA infection. So that great surgery was severely compromised. Why? Because of the surgery, which was the big thing? Or what was the thing that got the patient? Yes, the little thing.

The "Little" Things in Personal Finance

Most people have good advisors, attorneys, accountants and brokers. These advisors do all of the big things. Unfortunately, they often overlook the little things. One such area is Powers of Attorney(POA). Of the thousands of POAs that we have looked at, although they were all perfectly legal, they were missing important things.

For example: The Social Security Administration, Veteran's Administration, and the IRS will not honor your POA unless it has specific language pertaining to those areas. Knowing what you know about the government, what's the likelihood that the language used by these entities are all the same? Exactly, none of them do! That's just one of nine things that we find that basic POAs are missing. Why is this important? Because you use POAs to withdraw money.

Banks and Brokerages

Even though a POA is completely legal, if it's missing these nine things, many banks and brokerages will turn them down. What's the advantage to a bank or brokerage for turning down a POA? They get to hold on to the funds longer and continue to make more money. They have no financial reason to honor it. It's actually negative financially for them to honor it. In fact, if they honor it and find out later that it wasn't the most current or correct POA, they could end up getting sued.

21-Point Checklist

If you're going on a long roadtrip, it's important to make sure that your vehicle is checked and ready. You take it to a mechanic, and they would perform a 10-or-12-Point Check. Similarly, you should have your personal financial situation checked out. There are actually 21 common "little" things that can bite you. And they can cause BIG problems. These 21 different things are important items that your bankers, brokers, attorneys and accountants miss.

Don't let the "little" things trip up you and your family. Make sure that the Eye of the Tiger is watching out for you!$

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