Personal loss exposed the harsh realities of the business and led financial planner to set up her own practice
Renee Rebelo was days away from embarking on a law career when tragedy struck. Little did she know much it would change her life.
The Grimsby-based financial advisor, and founder of Life Coach Financial Strategies, was about to travel to Ottawa to start criminology studies when her dad passed away suddenly at just 42. Instead of going to school, she spent the year helping her mom deal with the financial aftermath: it was not pretty.
Unbeknown to her parents, they had been declined mortgage insurance and Rebelo’s mom went bankrupt. Her daughter discovered that the contrasting advice from various institutions was a minefield for the uninitiated.
Fuelled by a sense of injustice and a burning desire to ensure no one else should suffer in the same way, Rebelo, then 21, set about understanding the world of finance. So impressive and thorough was she that soon one of the institutions offered her a job.
She said: “That started my career in the industry. I was always about educating because of what had happened with my parents, who lost everything, and because there was a lack of financial knowledge.”
After 10 years of quick promotions across three institutions, Rebelo felt limited by what she saw as an overly numbers-based approach. Done with the corporate world, she quit and started her own company in the wake of the financial crash of 2008. Not everyone thought it was a wise move.
She said: “It was scary initially. I was a single mom at the time and the kids were very young (seven and eight). I thought, worst-case scenario I’ll just go back to corporate, right?
“Everyone said it was crazy. What are you doing? Tons of people were telling me the company name was dumb, I’m never going to survive, I was too young in the industry and there were too many other people that do what you do. I was like, I’m not listening to any of you - what will be, will be.”
With retirement-focused clients, Rebelo grew her business, while also setting up Savvy Living for Women, which offers business advice to women and now-focuses on helping them achieve a work-life balance. Her personal passion for the industry has blossomed into other avenues, with dinner events, motivational speaking, a monthly radio show on Newstalk 610 CKTB and a book, The 30 Day Financial Declutter Challenge, set for publication this year.
She said the crash presented her with a chance to offer value, while her personable approach to the advisory role still means she is able to attract clients unhappy with less-attentive financial planners.
She said: “I saw the crash as an opportunity because people are going to be looking at their statements. I didn’t see it as a negative; I saw it as an opportunity to educate people because they are actually paying attention to their finances.”
The 43-year-old added: “A lot people don’t feel validated by their current financial person; they are not listening to what their real needs are; they don’t understand what they are saying because they use too much lingo. But the biggest one is that clients feel they are not being paid attention to - they just don’t feel they have a relationship with the person.”
Investment trailers remain Rebelo’s main source of income and she believes not every client wants a fee-based model. She likes to sit down with clients and give them the worst-case scenario to know how they are going to react in a downturn.
She said: “Everyone is worried about the market and the volatility right now. I am a planner so I always focus on the long term, so when I sit down to talk to my clients I actually accentuate the worse years.
“Because we had 2008 I can leverage that to show how people felt about their investments at the time and so that also helps that conversation. How did it feel in 2008? How did you feel in 2015 when we had a negative year for some portfolios?”
She added: “Anyone can sell a good performing [portfolio] but it’s the down-performing portfolio that really tells you want your clients are going to do and how they are going to feel when the statement comes in that you are down.”
