Don't continue to let financial matters slide

Getting your financial house in complete order and keeping it that way is as daunting a task as going on a diet or quitting smoking.
As we approach the midpoint of the year, I'd like to reach out to those who had great intentions in January but have not made significant progress. Each day, millions of people put off significant issues that need addressing. People who can afford to hire the right people to get it all together are often just as delinquent as those with little or no wealth.

The task can be intimidating for a number of reasons. You have perceptions of what you need, and your view of what you need is driven by what you want. Serving your wants should be the goal of any team of financial advisers, but it is also the job of those advisers to show you what you need. For example, shouldn't any adviser continuously nudge you if he or she is aware that you are underinsured or without a current set of wills and trusts?

Another reason for the intimidation is that many advisers use jargon or technical terms that the average person doesn't understand. How many times have you listened to a lawyer, accountant or insurance professional present a concept and not understood a word?

And now, given the time of year, the biggest reason people deny themselves the right to get their financial act together is weather. Are you one of those who plan to get it together after the summer? I've known people who each year use the summer and the holiday seasons as reasons they can't tend to financial issues just yet.

Perhaps you can use the summer as your time frame for getting it all together. This all starts with reviewing your team of advisers and deciding whether this team is functioning.

To make this judgment, you can't only ask your current team members. How many of them would be willing to expose what they haven't done for you over the years? This process is work. It will require your time and that of a dedicated team. If you start now, you can know that you've done everything that you can to get your financial house in order and focus on keeping it that way permanently.

John P. Napolitano is CEO of U.S. Wealth Management in Braintree, Mass., and 2012 president of the Financial Planning Association of Massachusetts. He may be reached at jnap@uswealthcompanies.com or on Facebook as JohnPNapolitano and US Wealth

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