There is one independent financial planner in Australia for every 319,000 people. By comparison, Australia’s 10th biggest city Wollongong has only 290,000 people. So clearly independent financial planners are as rare as hen’s teeth and you’ll need extremely good luck finding one!
On the first day of independence we shared our Declaration of Independence showing Quantum Financial is more independent than ever. On the second day of independence we explained that independence by itself is simply not enough.
On the third day of independence we analyse how many independent financial planners there are and exactly where they are in Australia.
According to the respected website, SuperGuide, there are only 74 independent financial planners in Australia. Quantum Financial planners are among them.
The main reasons they are so rare is the vast majority (circa 80%, source: AFR) of advisors choose to tie themselves to a financial institution (typically NAB/MLC, Westpac/BT, ANZ, CBA/Count or AMP). This precludes them from calling themselves independent as the law recognises they are inherently conflicted towards their own company’s products.
The majority of the remainder (circa 19.5%) are not tied to a financial institution but still accept conflicted remuneration from financial institutions in the form of commissions. You can easily identify these – they market themselves as “independently owned” or “privately owned” in an attempt to skirt the letter of the law and convey a sense of independence.
We show our key conclusions from our analysis of where you can find an independent financial planner:
- The ACT is the easiest state/territory in Australian to find an independent financial planner. There is one independent financial planner for every 129,000 people. If you need a clue in the ACT, google “Brocktons Independent Advisory” and you’ll get most of them in the ACT.
- The next easiest place to find an independent financial planner is Victoria. There is one independent financial planner for every 202,000 people. If you google “Roskow Independent Advisory” this is a respected brand in this category.
- In Queensland it jumps to one independent financial planner for every 296,000 people. Google “Tupicoffs” and you’ll find 40% of them in the state.
- NSW comes in next at a big jump to one independent financial planner for every 359,000 people. At Quantum Financial, we represent 20% of them in NSW and we also service a number of wonderful clients in Brisbane and Melbourne.
- South Australia and Western Australia are in a league of their own, jumping up to one independent financial planner for every 844,000 and 863,000 people respectively. Googling “Astute Investing” will return you SA’s two respected independent financial planners.
- If you’re in the Northern Territory or Tasmania, I’m sorry but you’re flush out of luck. There are currently no independent financial planners in your home state/territory.
We show our analysis on the number of independent financial planners by state/territory below:
Source: SuperGuide, Quantum Financial estimates, ABS
We recommend the original SuperGuide article which can be read here.
We hope you enjoyed this analysis of the third day of independence.
