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The Admired Advisor Podcast


Dec 6, 2021

At the very end of our lives, we shouldn’t be concerned about the financial well-being of those we’re leaving behind. Unfortunately for many, that peace of mind is a luxury. Neel Shah of Beacon Wealth Solutions is on a mission to bring that financial peace to as many clients as possible through a complete planning approach.

After graduating with a finance degree, Neel had to choose between the financial advisory path and law school. Ultimately, Neel chose law school and spent the next 20 years behind the wheel of corporate business and real estate transactions. After a while, Neel discovered his passion for the advisory side and began diving into trust and estate planning. 

Although an improvement, Neel still felt he could dig deeper with clients, so he revisited his old background and began developing relationships with CPAs, financial advisors, and insurance agents - professionals who quickly became his primary referral source. It wasn’t long before Neel’s firm fully embraced the RIA model and Beacon Wealth Solutions was born.

In this episode, Neel talks with Steve about executing that tough pivot, his unique outlook on clients, his role as a change agent, and the mindset shifts that transformed his career and his life.

Key Takeaways

  • [01:26] - About Beacon Wealth Solutions.
  • [05:17] - How Neel built out and executed his joint-service model.
  • [11:29] - How Neel shifted from retail to wholesale. 
  • [14:27] - What surprised Neel about shifting to direct-to-consumer.
  • [15:17] - Neel’s biggest daily challenge. 
  • [16:57] - How Neel gets clients to actually take action.
  • [18:24] - The biggest value-add for advisors. 
  • [21:12] - How Neel manages his time.
  • [26:16] - The clients who most benefit from Neel’s services.
  • [27:47] - Where Neel’s new clients come from. 
  • [31:41] - What the discovery process looks like. 
  • [32:19] - How Neel educates his clients. 
  • [34:08] - The importance of asking questions.
  • [35:10] - How to prioritize client goals.
  • [37:19] - The future of Beacon Wealth Solutions.

Quotes

(14:55) “We fall in love with what we have and what we do. And we think that we’re amazing at it. And clearly we should be amazing at it or else we shouldn’t be doing it. But I think what I underestimated is our need to be change agents. We need to be agents of change. We need to educate people that there are better ways of doing this.” ~ Neel Shah

(17:43) “The value that we bring is this EQ communication skill. And what I’ve learned more than ever is that that is probably the biggest value that I can bring to people. I think we kind of underestimate that because it might come naturally to us.” ~ Neel Shah

(18:27) “I’ve fallen less in love with what I do but more in love with for whom I do it. And if I go in with that mindset, that love mindset, I feel like that’s been one of the most impactful mindset shifts for me.” ~ Neel Shah

(34:13) “The power is really just asking the right questions. If you can ask the right questions, you’ll get everything that you need to know. And listen to their answers and then make sure that your follow-up questions relate to what they’re talking about. Because they’ll tell you exactly what’s on their mind. And if you have a set agenda going into that meeting of things that you think you want to talk about, they’re probably not listening to you anymore because you’re not addressing what’s on their mind.” ~ Neel Shah

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