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Top 100 Financial Advisers: Amanda Lee, principal, Stewart Brown Advisory

When Amanda Lee hung out the shingle for her financial advice business most people in the game were looking at the wrong end of the puzzle.

Amanda Lee. Picture: Nick Cubbin
Amanda Lee. Picture: Nick Cubbin

When Amanda Lee hung out the shingle for her financial advice business most people in the game were looking at the wrong end of the puzzle, trying to figure out how to maximise pre-tax income.

But few were looking at how to maximise post-tax income, something Lee says was the missing puzzle piece of financial advice.

“I never understood why anyone would look at it from a pre-tax situation,” Lee says. “I wanted to know where we were heading and there seemed to be nothing in that space. So I decided to go out on my own.”

Taking the jump from her comfortable gig in funds management at Bankers Trust, Lee struck out on her own almost 18 years ago.

“Over those 18 years I started to build up my advice base, my first clients are with me and doing well,” she says.

Lee’s interest in investment runs deep, having bought her first investment property at the age of just 19.

She ran her own business for several years before being approached by Stewart Brown, then spent another seven years operating her business alongside Stewart Brown.

“When you jump into bed, in a partnership, you don’t know if it’s going to work out,” she says.

“We had to value the business and we didn’t know if we liked each other.

“That’s 10 years down the track and about three years ago we moved all the clients over to Stewart Brown Advisory. The accounting practice and I like each other.”

But a lot has changed in the financial planning and advice realm in those 18 years. The sector is still grappling with the waves of change that hit it after the Hayne royal commission into the financial sector. The soaring cost of financial advice is making access for many increasingly out of reach.

Lee wants more simplification in advice and ensuring a sustainable profession: “There is a need for reform to reduce duplication and rising costs facing financial planners.”

But she says many people who reached out often did so without thinking through what they really want.

“A lot of people don’t know what an adviser does for them, sometimes they ask what do you offer and what can you do?” she says. “Some clients aren’t exactly sure what is the difference between an accountant and adviser.”

Most of the 147 clients Lee deals with from her Chatswood office are professionals, small business owners, and pre-and-post retirees. Average client account values sit around $2.6 million, while their average wealth is higher at around $6.8 million.

“I say to my clients, if we’re not giving you value for money let me know and we need to make adjustments,” says Lee. “It is costly, financial advice, investing is an expensive thing to do.”

The outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic has seen huge dislocations across markets, with a rapid drop of share markets in March and April last year.

Despite this, funds under management have grown at Stewart Brown Advisory, up to $385 million this year from $315 million the year before. Of this $25 million comes from existing clients.

“I would like to think we save clients the fees in better performance structuring, getting benefits through estate planning,” Lee says.

“When I was working at the big end of town everyone had $20 million to invest, but in the mum and dad space my typical client has investments around a $3 million portfolio and I look at it from an after-tax point of view.”

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Original URL: https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/the-deal-magazine/top-100-financial-advisers-amanda-lee-principal-stewart-brown-advisory/news-story/5540d9954e722545f8e3332731aefce3