Wealth Building Advice, Financial Help for Millennials and Gen Z – Business Insider
- Jeff Erdmann has topped Forbes’ US annual wealth adviser rankings for the last six years.
- Erdmann’s group at Merrill Lynch advises clients worth between $2.5 million and $11 billion.
- He explains how millennials and Gen Z can succeed at investing, housing, debt, and work.
As a group, millennials need all the wealth-building help they can get, while Generation Z is just starting to get into the workforce and is facing its own set of challenges.
Jeff Erdmann might be one of the people best positioned to assist them.
His wealth management business at BofA Merrill Lynch advises people and families with at least $2.5 million in wealth and $11 billion in total assets, and Erdmann himself was just named the best wealth manager in the US by Forbes for six year in a row.
He’s also been recognized as one of the best in the country by Barron’s for more than a decade.
In an exclusive interview with Insider, Erdmann revealed what both of the generations should know about planning for the future, and how millennials and Gen Z can address some of the specific financial dilemmas they might face.
Manage all your debts
The idea of attacking debts one at a time based on their interest rates or the size of the monthly payment has become a popular one. Erdmann doesn’t recommend that, instead preferring to chip away at all of your debt simultaneously.
Erdmann acknowledges that paying down multiple debts at the same time can be difficult, but he said the important thing to remember is you should keep investing.
“I have seen people say, ‘Okay, I’m going to pay off my mortgage and then I’ll put money in my 401(k),’ or ‘I’m only going to put money in my 401(k), I’m not going to buy a house,'” he said. But neglecting to make a long-term investment can prove costly even if it saves money in the short term.
“Whether it’s how housing, retirement planning, education planning for your kids, they’re equally important,” he said. “Instead of trying to knock one out all at once, I would be chipping away at all of them at the same time.”
He said it’s important to understand debt and interest rates. Those rates have been historically low for years, which makes this a good time to borrow, but Erdmann says everyone should understand they might not stay that way, so adjustable-rate debts could be risky later on.
He said he’s less concerned about what low rates mean for investments such as bonds, where the return can be determined by the level of …….