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SMSF trustees turning to accountants

Super

New research indicates SMSF trustees are increasingly turning to accountants rather than planners for their unmet advice needs.

By Staff Reporter 8 minute read

The Investment Trends 2015 Self-Managed Super Fund (SMSF) Report shows the proportion of SMSF trustees with unmet advice needs intending to approach planners and other guides such as specialist super consultants has fallen from 70 per cent in 2014 to 54 per cent this year.

Meanwhile, the proportion of SMSF trustees turning to accountants, on the other hand, has increased from 50 per cent to 52 per cent.

This result is particularly interesting, given that SMSF investors indicated the advice they need the most includes pension strategies, building an income stream and wealth preservation.

“Those topics are not necessarily areas that accountants traditionally provide,” said Investment Trends head of research Recep III Peker.

“The area that more accountants provide advice on than financial advisers is tax planning, and you would expect that, but for other areas financial advisers really stand out, especially on things like advice on ETFs, investing for regular income, retirement income product selection and protecting assets and income against market falls,” Mr Peker said.

According to the Investment Trends report, the shift in consumer intentions away from planners could result from poor experiences, the high cost of advisers and SMSFs believing “advisers lack a strong code of conduct/ethics”.

“What you'll find is that there's always a group of people out there who don't trust financial planners,” Mr Peker said.

“Over the past year, planners have had some bad press – that's just reinforced the advice sceptics.”

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