They charge whatever they can. They prefer a asset-based relationship such as zone_8grandma has, but you can find many CFPs who will work on an hourly basis for you. But there is no CFP unionizing, so theres no set hourly rate. YouÂll just have to call around and see what pros in your area are charging. Go to the Financial Planning Association website and you can search for assistance. At the top RH of the screen there's a link called "Find a Planner". It's been a while since I went through the process, so I don't remember if you can search for fee-based vs asset-based planners. If not, find a planner who accepts your portfolio size (most have minimums) and call them to ask if they can recommend someone to you. Most CFPs are happy to try to help you find the right planner for your situation. Tax planning is done by your tax advisor, not an estate planner. Estate planning fees can range from $500+ for a computer-based "plug in the numbers" plan, to the totally customized report produced by a CFP I worked for last year, for which she charged anywhere from $4K to $9K, depending on the complexity. After helping her produce those customized estate plans for the 18 months I worked at an independent (asset based only) CFP office, I'd have to say there was no comparison between the software stuff versus the incredibly detailed, comprehensive overview and recommendations produced by four weeks of reading every single word of every one of your financial/legal/insurance documents that the CFP had to wade through. Now, if your estate isn't complicated, you could make do with a decent software produced estate plan in the $1-2K range. Just remember, however, that these are all based on data you provide. A CFP and an estate lawyer are needed for estate planning. The CFP gives you the map for getting where you want to go - their recommendations are your instructions to carry out. The estate lawyer creates the nice tight legal package you need, which is usually a flat fee package. A good estate plan is a map: where are you, and how will you get to your goal? WHAT YOUR GOAL IS, MUST BE DEFINED BY YOU. This is the single biggest thing most people need from talking to a financial planner - they really must identify what their ultimate goals are. Too often it's a vague, "I'd like to retire early but want to send my three kids to college and graduate school too; oh, and I need a new car and want to buy a bigger house." There were people who got offended when the CFP would look at their finances and tell them there was no way they were going to retire early, due to the double whammy of not enough savings and too-lavish spending. It isnÂt unusual for clients to make the CFPÂs minimums, and then ten years later end up broke because they wouldnÂt listen to the CFP telling them they needed to stop drawing down their money so fast. My boss was fond of saying that half the clients had to be encouraged to spend money, and the other half had to be prevented from spending themselves into poverty. How often do you meet? ThatÂs an individual thing. You can figure that an asset-based relationship will cost you between 1% to 1.75% of your portfolio (the less you have to invest, the more you pay). So do the math: 1% of $250K would be $2500/yr youÂd pay in an asset-based relationship (realistically it would be a higher percentage/cost, but letÂs use 1% because itÂs easier to figure). In that year, you could meet with the CFP as many times as you want, for as long as you need. If it takes four hours to explain ETFs and their tax consequences to your situation, the CFP will take the time for you. If you want advice on whether to take advantage of the new variable annuity 401k option your employer just started offering, theyÂll run the numbers for you in different scenarios so you can tell whatÂll work best for you. Most people wanted quarterly visits, after they received their quarterly investment reports. Those visits generally lasted 1-2 hours. If it was a family trust with multiple siblings, it wasnÂt unusual for those visits to be more like 3-4 hours or more. The advantage of asset based vs fee based was that clients (at least where I worked) received an incredibly comprehensive financial service that coordinated tax planning, insurance, estate planning and legal services to make the transfer of assets, whether from a lifestyle change like retirement, or a death transfer to heirs, as easy as possible. What you will need depends on your individual situation. But honestly, I think most people need an asset-based relationship  they just donÂt have enough knowledge to coordinate all the different and crucial details involved in transfering assets, unless they have someone they can depend upon. I hope you find someone good that you will be able to build a relationship with, whether fee- or asset-based. Best of luck to you.

Ole Joyful has the training and instincts to be a good advisor. Most people don't. If you have bad instincts and can be panicked by the media headlines, you are NOT going to be a good investor. You could have all the knowledge in the world, but your emotions will drive your decisions. You will probably buy high and sell low, the exact opposite of what you should do. A lot of times a good advisor has to say "no" to clients. "No, you can't plan to withdraw 10% per year, your money will run out too fast." "No, being 100% in bonds and Treasuries is not a guarantee against losing money." A good advisor positions his/her clients for the mid- to long-term, based on their risk profile. The reason for that has to do with logistics. Here's what's involved with trade decisions in the CFP office I used to work in: 1) Quarter ends (let's say it's 3/31/2011, sometimes written as 1Q11). 2) Reports from the brokerages don't come on-line to the advisor's office until 2-5 weeks after the quarter ends, or approximately 4/30/2011. 3) To generate individual reports for each client requires a massive back office op; it took 5 people (two CFPs, one analyst, three clerks) to produce reports for the 140 clients, as many had multiple accounts and a separate report is generated for each account. It took us a minimum of four weeks as this CFP liked to heavily customize his services. Some clients preferred to see a different set of benchmarks used; for example, one liked to have the Wilshire 5000 instead of the S&P 500, and another always wanted to see the Russell small cap index benchmark included. So that 4 weeks now brings us to 5/31/2011, when we are stuffing envelopes and mailing the reports out to the clients. I'm sure some have by now switched to paperless, but that doesn't subtract more than a week and maybe one person, off the process. Let's be generous and say going paperless gets you your 3/31 quarterly report by 5/15. 4) You read your report, with its recommendations for any portfolio changes, the very next day, 5/16. You're so organized, you even already have your quarterly meeting date scheduled in advance, so you're going in to talk to the CFP the very next week. This is unusual, most clients didn't schedule a meeting until they had their report in hand, so often we were scheduling July meetings to discuss that 3/31 report. Some clients would call and okay the portfolio changes, but most liked to come in and chat with the CFPs, because they were like family. Every meeting took at least 90 minutes, and some that were family accounts, were known for taking 2 to 2-1/2 hrs. 5) Once we got the client's okay, the analyst was given permission to execute whatever trades we had recommended for that client, on that 3/31 report. Still with me? We're mostly through the second quarter, sometimes even shading into the third quarter, before we get the client's okay to change the portfolio. Now, why does it take so long? Because the CFP is looking at those mid- to long-term trends, not the short-term 'next 3 months' that a commissioned broker is 100% focused on. In almost two years of working at the CFP's office, and four years of working with another independent CFP who handles MIL's portfolio, NO TRADES ever take place without client permission or outside the routine quarterly reporting system. There are no tips for "hot sectors" or "above average returns at little risk". This is why it's a whole different world, when you find an advisor who is worth working with. Because a good advisor will happily bend your ear for hours, teaching you as much as you want to know. A bad one never has enough time for you, unless he wants you to write a check!

Just posting an update since we met with the designer last night. Turns out that he would have been collecting the following types of compensation under his "flat rate" model: - charging us a flat amount for design fees - marking up purchases 12% from his cost - marking up bids from contractors by some higher amount (which apparently varies by project) to cover his costs for overseeing the project, insurance, etc. He said he made the switch to hourly given the amount of research and shopping we were doing. He also asserted that he would have earned close to the same amount for the project on the original billing rate because of the markups. That is faulty logic and we told him so - our budget was our budget so marking up purchases would have meant we would have been buying less items and/or lower-quality items in order to stay within our budget. 12% of $17K is $2200 no matter what items you buy for it. And our labor costs are modest because the space was already roughed in, so he would have needed an ENORMOUS markup on the labor charges to get anywhere close to the amount that he was showing as payable based on his hourly rate. We also told him that had we known that we were being charged for every hour of work we would have used him differently. Until I asked, he never presented an interim summary of his hours or billings, or mentioned any concern for how we would stay within our budget given how much of his time he was spending. But he WAS aware of our budget and knew that we were going to some lengths to try to stick to it. To me this is the most important issue that makes his billed hours an unfair amount. A lot of our time in research was spent trying to find affordable alternatives for some of the ideas that he presented - we didn't want to change the design but we couldn't afford to do what he was suggesting. Logic says that he really wasn't being that mindful of the budget issues in presenting appropriate ideas in the first place. The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that this was a MAJOR disconnect on his part, which meant that a large number of his hours were billed without regard to what would be in our best interest. He conceded that he should have been much clearer about what terms he was thinking of changing and what the impact of that change would be on us. He is going to look at his time and use a couple of alternative approaches for how he could be compensated to come up with a number that will be his flat fee for the entire project, capped. Supposed to get Monday am. Said he really wants to oversee the completion of the work and understands that we will not explicitly compensate him for that. I am still concerned about what number he is going to propose but at least it will hopefully be in the neighborhood of a more fair amount.

Your fees vary according to the cost to the entity and the amount they are given by local and federal groups. IF it is a shelter (or what the ASPCA or HSUS considers a shelter), there are many grants that can be obtained. Our fee (about 3 yrs ago) was $90 in our suburbian area. That included spay/neuter, heartworm test, first round of shots (or 2nd if a documented animal that had had first round), and deworming. The breakdown was this.... - $10 for heartworm test. Vets here charge $36. - $6 shots. This was the parvo/distemper/yadyadayada shot (6/1 shot).. Vets charge $16 - $35 for spay/neuter. Vets charge per size of dog or cat -- this can be upwards of $120 if a large female dog. Their least fee is $80 for a cat neuter. So $35 is a bargain. - $6 deworming. Vets charge $6 for deworming around here. - $16 rabies shot. State law in TN dictates $16 for rabies and licensure (dog license is imbedded with the rabies shot). We only charged the adopter the cost of our supplies for the animal. And we never charged for the upkeep or feeding during the animal's stay. That is what made us a non-profit. If an animal was already spay/neutered, we still charged the standard $90. That is because we had other costs for the shelter that held that animal alive. Those costs included feeding, housing, cleaning, electrical and euthanasia of other animals. Also included was 2 months of "Shelterpet" pet insurance for an adopted animal and minor training. To me that is quite a bargain. We are in TN and many vet fees are significantly higher than our vets in our area. However, most areas outside of TN are much higher than our state. Our fee was quite reasonable and we are a non-profit. There are pure-breed rescues that charge more. However, you have to consider that purebreed rescues have to compete for the attention of those that want to adopt from breeders. Frankly, the dogs that purebreed rescues have for adoption CAME from purebred breeders. Our shelter would also adopt to legitimate "purebreed" rescue agencies simply for the price of spay/neuter ($35. By law in TN, you cannot let any animal leave your shelter without promise of spay/neuter. We eliminated the "if" factor and required that we do it before we let the animal go). I hope this post gives folks a broader understanding of the costs shelters are associated with.