Auto-enrolment is a major development on the horizon for Irish employers. With the government's plan to introduce this new pension scheme, it’s vital that businesses of all sizes understand what it entails, why it is being introduced, and how they can best prepare for the upcoming changes. As your financial adviser, we want to guide you through some of the key questions, ensuring you’re equipped with the right information to make sensible decisions about this important development for your company and your employees.

We often hear the phrase “life is not a rehearsal,” but how often do we truly stop to reflect on its meaning? Life is fleeting, unpredictable, and precious. Yet, many of us live as though there will always be another chance, another opportunity to do the things we desire.

When you think of retirement, what comes to mind? Is it those extra rounds of golf, spending a few months each year basking in the sun, and relishing quality time with your grandkids? Or do you find yourself worrying about your pension funding, fearing it might not be sufficient to cover all your dreams and aspirations?

The most famous of all investors, Warren Buffett once said, “People seeking riches never have enough. Wealth is a state of mind. Wealthy people always have enough.” To him, riches are a monetary amount and never satisfy you. On the other hand, wealth is a journey and a set of actions that lead to a more fulfilled life.

You might be wondering if you need to bother reviewing your financial plan every year. After all, if we've already done the hard work of setting it up, why tinker with it? Here’s the simple truth: the world changes, life changes, and so must your financial plan. Skipping your annual financial review is a bit like ignoring an engine light on your car’s dashboard—it might not seem urgent until it's too late. Let's consider why these reviews are crucial and how they can keep you on track to achieving your financial goals. 

Sometimes when it comes to life assurance and cover for living benefits within specified illness and income protection policies, you can get a little lost in the marketing messages of the different features and benefits that are available in the market. While these are of course important in helping you (with our guidance) choose your preferred policy, it’s really important to never lose sight of the real reason for taking out insurance, and that comes back to one single key aspect – that the insurer will pay out to you or your loved ones in your time of need.

Ending a marriage is usually a really tough time. There are big decisions to make about who gets to take care of the kids, how often each parent gets to see them, and where everyone's going to live. Often, things get pretty tense between the ex-partners.

Maybe it’s a stage in life that you get to, when eventually you recognise that building wealth for most people is a pursuit that happens over many years, indeed decades. And most importantly, that it’s perfectly acceptable to build wealth slowly.

OK, we don’t want to blow our own trumpets, but we got access to some research recently that was simply too good not to share the key findings with you. The research titled “The value of financial planning” was carried out by the Financial Planning Standard Board, in which they surveyed over 15,000 consumers in 15 countries, including Ireland. The full report can be found here.

As our clients progress through their financial lives, we see a consistent trend. Thoughts tend to move from thinking about the “here and now” to a much greater focus on the future. While the age at which this happens varies from client to client, retirement coming on to the horizon is an obvious driver for this mind shift. Alongside this, or maybe lagging by a few years are thoughts and conversations about passing wealth efficiently to loved ones. Of course, this opens up the whole discussion about estate planning.

The word retirement conjures up different thoughts for each of us. Some think of growing old, others think of enjoying life in the sun. Some people think of the need to save money in pensions, others think of finally having that freedom from work and enjoying their financial freedom. Each view is valid, some just a bit more positive than others.

So here we are again, digging around for eligible receipts to reduce our upcoming tax bill. Sometimes in the rush to complete the tax return on time, valuable tax-saving opportunities are missed. So here are a few ways for you to reduce your upcoming bill.

ESG Investing is here to stay. This is being driven firstly by a raft of new regulations and legislation coming from the EU around responsible investing, ensuring that investment managers consider carefully the ESG credentials of the assets in which they invest.

“It’s not just about the money” is a phrase I find myself using in nearly every client meeting these days. This stems from the evolution of the role of financial advisers and planners in recent years – a shift from focusing solely on a client’s money and investment returns achieved to a focus on the client as a person and what you want to achieve in your life. Our role today is to help you achieve your desired future life through careful and wise decision making in relation to all aspects of your finances.

When we’re designing an investment portfolio for our clients, we take into account quite a number of considerations. We start by understanding your investment goals and time horizons, and then we build a full understanding of your liquidity requirements, any asset class preferences that you might have and also the returns that you expect.

Do you remember 2013? It sounds quite recent, but then when you think about the major events that happened that year, they seem so long ago. That was the year that Nelson Mandela died at the age of 95, two homemade bombs ripped through the crowd of fans and runners at the Boston Marathon finish line, killing three and wounding nearly 300 others and Typhoon Haiyan killed over 6,000 people in the Philippines and south east Asia. It was also the year the word "selfie" became mainstream!

Money management is a crucial skill that every child should learn at an early age. Learning how to manage finances is not just about budgeting and saving, but it’s also about building a healthy relationship with money. As parents, it’s our responsibility to teach our children about money and help them make wise financial decisions in the future. We’re going to set out five valuable lessons that you can give to your children about money.

Picture the scene – I hope it applies to you today or in the not-too-distant future… You’ve got to that point in your financial life where life is getting easier. Maybe the mortgage is paid off or almost there, and you are finally seeing your savings grow incrementally each year, even though you are doing most of the things that you want to do. You are finally seeing that after a nice holiday or two, socialising as you like and changing the car every couple of years, there is still some money left over.