By Heidi Huiskamp, Founder and CEO of Huiskamp Collins Investments, LLC
You might already work with a financial advisor. He or she might have rolled over your 401(k), sold you an annuity, or maybe set up a college savings plan for your children or grandchildren. I bet they make sure you get your statements on time, send you your tax forms, and even meet with you once a year to review your accounts. You probably think the level of service you receive is acceptable and the norm for financial professionals. What if I told you that I interact differently with my clients? What if I told you that I treat my clients like family, take a “one-stop-shop” approach to make my customers’ lives easier, and forge a relationship with my clients, operating with honesty, trustworthiness, and integrity, that helps my customers sleep at night? With the help of the trademarked C.O.R.E.TM system (Client Onboarding Relationship-building Experience), I’ve crafted my financial practice to address all your needs: Preserving and Growing Your Assets, Planning to Invest and Live on Your Assets, Preparing to Pass on Your Assets, Protecting Your Assets, Getting/Keeping Your “Financial House” in Order by organizing all your House in OrderTM information into a Fire Box and giving you access to a digital House in Order BoxTM on your computer and smart phone. I also help business owners with everything from creating and maintaining a budget to helping establish and mentor start-ups to working with your tax professionals and attorneys to helping you create a succession plan.
Have you ever heard the term “fiduciary” tossed around in regards to financial professionals? If not, you need to know that it’s of paramount importance to you. A fiduciary is someone who ALWAYS puts their client’s best interests ahead of their own: no ifs, ands or buts. I have been an active investor for 40 years and a licensed financial advisor for almost 20 years. I hold my Series 7 and Series 66 securities licenses and ONLY do business as a fiduciary. Not everyone who holds themselves out as a “financial advisor” is a fiduciary, so please be sure that’s your first question when interviewing a new advisor.
I often have new clients or prospective clients come sit at my table and share snacks and gourmet coffee with me and tell me that they have “all this stuff, but they don’t know why they have it, how it works, and if it’s the right solution for their situation.” There’s a lot of confusion, unanswered questions, and anxiety out there over finances, even among those who have been working with a professional. I believe in education, common-sense language, and helping clients set realistic expectations when it comes to their financial health. At the end of the day, do you really care about alpha and beta and risk coefficients? No, you want the peace of mind that comes from co-creating a plan and taking a holistic approach that answers the question effectively, “Am I/We Going to be O.K.?” You want someone who is going to help you review not only your investment accounts, but your other assets, your insurance coverages, your bank accounts, your estate planning, your prescriptions, your emergency contacts and your asset protection information (medical or Medicare supplements, prescription drug coverage, identity protection, life insurance, long-term care). I offer a completely different way of interacting with my clients by putting our relationship and all their varied needs at the forefront.
As regards to investing, I’m passionate about it…it’s what I do for fun! After a full day of work, I greet our standard poodle, Lucy, and enjoy dinner with my husband. Afterwards, I don’t watch TV or engage on social media. Instead, I read the Wall Street Journal cover-to-cover and then read financial magazines and blogs. I analyze stocks and pore over financial statements at my kitchen table. The investments that I unearth from all that analysis are not the kind of ideas that one is going to find in a typical “one-size-fits-all” financial plan. I believe that all investors should have access to superior customer service and the best financial planning and attention to all their needs that I can supply.
Community outreach, especially making a better world for children, is a cornerstone of my personal mission and one of the reasons I left the corporate world to establish my own firm. I volunteer weekly at Lourdes Catholic School and teach Junior Achievement at Paul Norton Elementary. I am thrilled to be a Charter Member of Women United which strives for early childhood education and Kindergarten-readiness for all children, regardless of socioeconomic status. I have also mentored “at-risk” children through Big Brothers / Big Sisters for the last 20 years and currently mentor Myiah, a 5th grader at The Rock Island Academy who lives in poverty and has 11 brothers and sisters. In addition, I am on the board of the Rock Island / Milan 1st Day Fund which distributes free school supplies to at-risk children in the Rock Island / Milan School District. In 2019, the board distributed supplies to 4,800 children with an economic impact of just shy of $100,000. I am also thrilled to serve on the Board of the Martin Luther King Center in Rock Island and am the President of the Bettendorf Business Network in addition to serving on six other non-profit boards in the Quad-Cities community.
Earlier this year, I was deeply humbled and honored to be chosen as the 2020 Athena Award Winner. Women in our community are nominated by their peers as being leaders in their business or profession, serving as a role model to other women in their profession and the broader community, bringing creativity and innovation to their professions, and contributing their time and energy to community betterment. Many women were nominated and the field was narrowed down to four Honorees who were recognized at a wonderful luncheon. A selection committee of past Honorees and community leaders chose one winner, announced at the luncheon, and I was truly blessed to hear my name and be called to the stage. I was so grateful to be named an Honoree and was not expecting to win so had not prepared any remarks. Instead, I told the story about one of my clients I called “Mary” who provides round-the-clock care, 365 days a year to her infirm husband who is wheelchair-bound and cannot speak. “Mary” and the other unsung women in our communities who take care of our babies, our aging parents, our sick spouses, our church committees, our P.T.A.s…those sisters of mine are my heroes. I’m not half the women that they are in the acts of great love that they perform selflessly every day.
I would love to connect with you and show you that finding expertise in financial planning with a heart and getting your “financial house in order” really does make a difference in your client experience. Please call me at 563-949-4705 or email me at heidi@hhcinvestments.net. Thank you in advance for your consideration.
Securities offered through J.W. Cole Financial, Inc. (JWC) Member FINRA/SIPC. Advisory services offered through J.W. Cole Advisors, Inc. (JWCA). Huiskamp Collins Investments, LLC and JWC/JWCA are unaffiliated entities.