Invest With Pride: Finding the Right LGBTQ+ Financial Planner

Pride Month has become a widespread movement to vocalize support and raise awareness around LGBTQ+ issues. It’s a time to come together and celebrate the contributions of the LGBTQ+ community, commemorate the historical impact, and acknowledge the continued struggle for visibility and equal legal rights across the country. However, it’s important to recognize that celebrating Pride should go beyond the month of June. At Coldstream, we understand the sensitivities and complexities of financial planning for LGBTQ+ individuals and families – something we view as a year-round priority and commitment.

Understanding these unique financial planning challenges and how to proactively navigate them can be imperative to the long-term financial success of LGBTQ+ individuals. Even after the legalization of same-sex marriage in 2015 and changes in federal protection laws over the past 20 years, the LGBTQ+ community has specific needs that often differ from heteronormative individuals and couples. For example:

• Individual states may not recognize all types of legally prepared estate documents.
• LGBTQ+ individuals may be legally fired or denied housing, mortgage applications, and health treatment—all based on individual state rights and provider opinions.
• Family planning costs are usually much higher, ranging from IVF to surrogacy to adoption.
• Investment and pension contracts can have language with hidden, unintentional (or intentional) adverse ramifications for same sex couples that wouldn’t necessarily apply to non-LGBTQ+ individuals.

We believe your wealth management team needs to recognize how major life transitions such as marriage, buying a home, retirement, and the death or disability of a partner/ spouse specifically impacts members of the LGBTQ+ community.

In 2022, at a time when many financial firms are expanding to serve a diversifying population, it’s important to understand how to identify companies that genuinely consider factors unique to members of the LGBTQ+ community.

When evaluating potential advisors, consider asking the following questions to help determine if they can best meet you and your family’s needs:

• How are you aligned with the LGBTQ+ community?
• How many LGBTQ+ clients have you worked with?
• What professional resources can you bring to help with a holistic LGBTQ+ financial planning lens?
• How do you align estate, tax, and insurance planning to fit the needs of LGBTQ+ clients?
• What do you identify as significant challenges in wealth management that are unique to LGBTQ+ clients?

The LGBTQ+ community deserves to work with financial advisors that value inclusion and proactively consider their client’s current and future needs. We encourage LGBTQ+ investors to find the right advisor and wealth management team – one who can faithfully represent them, with the experience and institutional knowledge to help individuals and their families thrive. Our familiarity and personal connections to the community help our advisory teams provide personalized services and create a proactive, holistic experience for our clients. At Coldstream, we can say with pride that we walk the walk all twelve months of the year.