There are many people who are confident that they can manage their money without any advice (Baba Google ki jai ho). There are many who think that they need an adviser. I am not here to argue either way, but I have seen portfolios – some destroyed by an adviser, and some destroyed by a DIY investor.

I am of the view that having a good adviser on your side is useful. If you can align your goals and pay for achieving goals (I know one big time investor who pays his main adviser a Fee percentage on the change in Net worth). However this is not for the common man – this guy has about Rs. 400 crores in own assets.

So decide for yourself. See if you are capable of doing it yourself. It’s your call. If you are in doubt, you cannot. The risk of not having an adviser is too high. When I say adviser, I mean good adviser. I have benefited by having a couple of advisers in my equity investing. The money that I have allows me to make a few investing mistakes. If your portfolio does not give you that luxury, be careful.

Retirement strategy or retirement plan can work ONLY if it is updated. Regularly. Imagine you were planning a trip to  Kashmir last week. Then a big dastardly act of terror happened. Will you still go ahead with your plan? What if there is a curfew? You need to plan accordingly. Updating is necessary is it not?

If you think you will hire an adviser when you turn 60 and get a plan. Think again. A plan has to be executed over a very long period of time. If you can, and are willing, you should write your ‘Retirement accumulation strategy’ – or Investment Strategy Statement. You can be sure it will look useless in 3 months, but it is still a good place to start. In any strategy statement, the uncertainty is a killer. And the fact that there is uncertainty is EXACTLY the reason that you need a plan. Just because you have to keep changing it does not mean it is useless!

We may get married, divorce, lose a partner to illness, deal with the illness and recovery of a loved one – all this will have an impact on the plan, is it not?

We may get an inheritance or may miss out an inheritance. We may hit a jackpot in ESOP. Or we may have some expense shocks – a person I know recently spent Rs. 28L for a fire victim’s hospitalization.

Will we be disciplined enough to update it? Will our adviser be able to help? Does he really know that all these struggles that you are having with yourself?

Even our Goals might change depending on the Goals of another person. Recently a friend got a bonus of Rs. 2 crores – his granddaughter decided to study in India instead of going to USA!! Any such thing will have an impact, right?

You need to understand that some things – like the 4% withdrawal syndrome could be wrong for long periods of time – be careful.

I do think having a good adviser helps.

However, like Swami Vivekananda, you should spend a lot of time in finding your Ramakrishna Paramhansa.