Financial Adviser - is it something you would recommend?

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We are a young family with 2 kids, both working full time. we have a mortgage. I have never thought of seeking advise, but now when there are 2 kids - wanted for someone to advise whether we are on a right track with pension, life insurances etc? do you think financial adviser will help us or is it sth we should think ourselves?

The most important thing is that they are independent so can advise you on the whole of the market and that they deal with people like you regularly so are used to looking at the right type of products.
Best practice is that you pay them a fee so that they could not be potentially swayed but the best commission.
I use Atkinson Boulton Consulting IFA of the year last year is the most recent award they have won.

I have always used an Independant Financial Advisor for several reasons:

• they can get much better deals than I can

• it saves me traipsing up and down the high street or trawling the internet

• you can usually pay them a fixed fee or they claim commission

• they managed to get me life insurance when nobody else could

• now that I am getting divorced they have managed to get way more mortgage than I could get myself.

Definately an Independent Financial Advisor. Depending on where you are I might be able to recommend one if you PM me your town.

If you are looking for an IFA then unbiased.co.uk has a list of authorised advisers (by the financial services authority - fsa) and you can run a postcode search to see who is near you.

Fee based advisers can seem more expensive than commission based, but on the whole fee based is better. Reason being they don't get a kick back from the products, funds or services that you decide to use and so tend to be unbiased. This doesn't mean that all commission based advisers are bad however.

Do you know anyone who uses a financial adviser that they would recommend and are they on the FSA register (see above)? If so, have a conversation with them. A good IFA will do this for free. Personality counts for a lot, you need to feel you can trust a person. Find out from them whether or not they are tied, or independent. Tied means that they can only offer you a limited number of options which have been agreed by their company. That may be right for you, but generally speaking access to whole of market is better.

Sorry, I posted there when I didn't mean to.

For some more guidance on questions to ask and what to look for see this article: www.money.co.uk/article/1005407-the-secret-to-finding-an-ifa-you-can-trust-with-your-money.htm

Apologies if I am making this sound complicated, it really isn't. You just want to make sure you trust your adviser, that they can offer you what you need. Generally someone who is willing to provide you with a financial health check - so looking across your finances, including your budgeting and what you spend on and combining this with your objectives is someone who is thinking about how to help you acheive what you need.

Alternatively - if you just ask for help with mortgages, or investment, or insurance they will do this.