At this week’s Business by Referral meeting, Cedric from Aspire Wealth took a different approach to his presentation. After sharing his story and delivering a number of presentations to the group over the years, he opened the floor for a Q&A on investing, retirement, corporations, insurance, home ownership, and financial planning.
The conversation covered plenty of ground, but one idea kept coming back: there is rarely one financial strategy that is right for everyone. The right answer depends on where you are today and where you want to go.
From Paris to Ottawa — With a Few Stops Along the Way
Cedric’s path into financial planning wasn’t exactly conventional.
Originally from Paris, he studied finance and marketing before completing mandatory military service in France — where, in an interesting career detour, he trained as a tank commander.
Afterward, rather than immediately putting on a suit and going into finance, Cedric followed another passion. After years of competitive skateboarding and with snowboarding taking off, he moved to the French Alps and became an entrepreneur.
Over the next decade, he built and operated a successful high-end ski and snowboard retail business across two resorts.
Eventually, an opportunity brought him to Canada. He worked in the sporting goods industry in Ottawa before a conversation with a financial advisor prompted another career change. Cedric went back to school, completed his licensing, and entered the financial services industry in 2011.
In 2017, he partnered with Jason Dashner, sharing a similar philosophy around customer service, relationships, and building a business around the needs of clients.
Today, Aspire Wealth operates as a boutique practice serving roughly 200 families.
Financial Planning Is More Than Watching a Portfolio
One of the first questions was how often clients should meet with their financial advisor.
For Cedric, the answer depends on the client, but Aspire Wealth generally reaches out for reviews twice a year.
The important part is that those conversations aren’t simply about whether an investment account went up or down.
Life changes.
Someone gets married or divorced. A child is born. A business grows. A client wants to purchase another property. Retirement gets closer. Insurance needs change. Tax considerations become more important.
A 25-year-old beginning to invest has very different planning needs from a 70-year-old preparing to convert retirement savings into retirement income.
The portfolio is only one piece of the conversation.
Your Accountant and Financial Advisor Should Work Together
For business owners in particular, one common question is whether money is better invested personally or through a corporation.
Cedric’s answer was essentially: it depends.
Corporate investing can provide opportunities, but the best strategy depends on factors such as how the owner pays themselves, available contribution room, future business plans, tax considerations, debt, and how money will eventually be withdrawn.
That is also why Cedric emphasized the value of having an accountant and financial advisor working together.
An accountant often provides an invaluable picture of what has already happened financially. A financial planner can then use that information to help determine what should happen next.
For a business owner, those two perspectives can complement each other extremely well.
Start With the Blueprint
Cedric compared financial planning to building a house.
You can have the best contractor, materials and tradespeople available, but before anyone starts building, you need a blueprint.
Financial planning should work the same way.
Before deciding which investment, account, insurance product or strategy to use, you first need to understand the bigger picture:
- What are you trying to accomplish?
- When do you need the money?
- What assets and liabilities do you already have?
- What income will you need in retirement?
- How much risk can you realistically tolerate?
- What happens if your circumstances change?
Aspire Wealth uses planning software to bring those pieces together and model different scenarios. The result is a financial blueprint that can help clients understand what they need to save and invest to reach their goals.
The investments come after the plan.
Do You Have to Own a Home to Build Wealth?
One of the more interesting discussions of the morning centred around home ownership.
For generations, owning a home has been closely associated with financial success. But with the cost of real estate today, younger Canadians may reasonably question whether purchasing a home is always the best financial decision.
Cedric encouraged looking beyond the idea that there is only one path.
Someone might own a home and build substantial equity. Someone else might rent, consistently invest the difference, and build wealth through financial markets. Another person might own several rental properties. Someone with a pension may require a completely different investment strategy.
Each approach can work.
What matters is understanding what your chosen path needs to produce over time.
A retirement plan can model real estate, investments, pensions, CPP, insurance, businesses and other assets together. Once you know the lifestyle and income you’re trying to create, you can work backward to determine what needs to happen today.
Risk Needs a Reason
Cedric also addressed a familiar temptation for investors: chasing high returns.
His approach starts with a much simpler question:
What is the money for?
If you have $10,000 earmarked for a wedding or another major expense in the near future, taking significant investment risk simply for the possibility of earning a higher return may not make sense.
If losing 20%, 30% or more would prevent you from accomplishing the goal, the potential return isn’t the only thing that matters.
Cedric compared it to driving somewhere. If there is no urgency, why take unnecessary risks to get there faster?
Long-term investing can involve volatility. The problem comes when investors focus on someone else’s impressive return without considering how much risk they took — or the losses they may have experienced along the way.
Can You Invest on Your Own?
Absolutely.
Cedric acknowledged that some people are successful managing their own investments. But doing it well requires time, research, discipline and an understanding of the risks involved.
Aspire Wealth itself offers different approaches, including lower-fee portfolios and more customized investment strategies depending on a client’s needs.
The value of advice isn’t simply having someone choose an investment. It’s having someone help connect the investment strategy to the larger plan.
Don’t Forget About Beneficiaries
Another practical takeaway from the discussion was the importance of periodically reviewing beneficiaries on investment and insurance accounts.
A beneficiary selected ten years ago may no longer reflect your current family situation or wishes.
Cedric also cautioned that decisions around revocable and irrevocable beneficiaries can have significant consequences. An irrevocable designation can make seemingly simple future changes much more complicated.
It’s one of those small details that can be easy to overlook — until it becomes very important.
There Is No Universal “Best” Financial Strategy
Perhaps the clearest lesson from Cedric’s Q&A was that personal finance is exactly that: personal.
Should you invest inside your corporation or personally?
Buy a house or rent and invest?
Choose a lower-risk portfolio or pursue more growth?
Manage your investments yourself or work with an advisor?
There isn’t a universal answer.
A good financial plan starts by understanding the individual, their goals, their timeline and their circumstances. From there, the investments, insurance, tax planning and other tools can be selected to support that bigger picture.
As Cedric put it through his blueprint analogy: before you start building, make sure you know what you’re trying to build.
Cedric — Aspire Wealth
Financial Planning, Investments & Insurance