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PRISM Wealth-Building Process
How to choose the right professional when you or a loved one needs help with finances like bill paying.
Charles Rotblut leads a class in AAII's new Essential Investing Video Course. Go to https://www.aaii.com/ves for more information and to subscribe.
Susie Marbury, CDMM, is the president of the American Association of Daily Money Managers (AADMM). She is also the founder and owner of Checks & Balances for You. Cynthia McLaughlin and I spoke to Marbury about the role of daily money managers (DMMs) and transitioning control of managing personal finances to a close relative or a daily money manager.
—Charles Rotblut, CFA
Cynthia McLaughlin (CM): For those who are unfamiliar with daily money managers, could you explain what they do?
Susie Marbury: The essential thing that a daily money manager does is help clients get their bills paid on time. We balance their accounts: checking accounts, credit cards, etc. We make sure that their financials look okay, monitoring their accounts for unusual activity.
There are also different niches that daily money managers work within. There is the senior niche, there’s the high net worth niche and there’s the busy professional niche. Now there is a millennial and younger niche targeted toward people who are starting out and need help trying to get their finances in order.
Part of what I’m saying will depend on the niche, but certainly for seniors another common activity is helping them make sure that their medical claims have been filed properly. If they get a bill, the daily money manager will look at the explanation of benefits (EOB) and make sure it looks correct. They don’t file claims or get into the medical aspects, but they check to make sure the dollar amounts look like they make sense.
Some daily money managers go to clients’ homes and work with them side by side, writing checks and letting the client sign them. Other daily money managers—I think more and more, especially since the coronavirus pandemic—are doing more things online and have access to a bank account that they can pay bills from. In general, it’s really about helping to manage the day-to-day finances.
Then there are always those ancillary activities. A client needs help with something or doesn’t know how to make a decision about something, and—assuming it has a financial impact of some sort—the daily money manager will help. Most likely, the daily money manager will get on the phone with the client and whoever the issue is with and will help the client talk through it.
That’s the general gist.
CM: It sounds like a very broad-reaching role.
Yes, it is, and it’s very different with every client. Some aspects of the job are the same, but the other aspects are very different because it depends on the client’s personality and how well they’re doing physically, mentally and emotionally.
CM: How do daily money managers interact with a financial adviser, a tax attorney or other professionals that either the client or their family work with?
In general, daily money managers like to feel like we’re part of a team that’s helping the client. We ask the client to introduce us to the other people who assist them. We get to know their certified public accountant (CPA), financial planner, geriatric care manager and whoever else is involved. That’s the preferred method.
For our clients, we don’t do anything with their investments. Their financial planner does all of that and we just manage the bills. We may track the monthly balance of their finances in Quicken. So, I know this month they have $1 million, next month they have $900,000, etc., but we don’t look at any of the details of what’s going on. We’re just giving them an idea of what their balance is in conjunction with their other accounts.
I think there are some daily money managers who may have more interaction in that regard, if they have the necessary credentials to do so. And again, it depends on what the client wants.
CM: What is the process for becoming certified as a daily money manager?
The initial requirements are that you have both worked as a daily money manager and received payment for doing so for 1,500 hours over a three-year period. You must demonstrate that you have been doing daily money management.
There is an exam that is given. If you pass the exam, you become a Certified Daily Money Manager (CDMM). Once you become certified, there’s a continuing education requirement that you must meet to recertify every three years.
Charles Rotblut (CR): There’s a background check too, right?
Every member of the American Association of Daily Money Managers (AADMM) has a background check. This began a few years back. The certification program had a background check before that, and it is part of the certification process. Now everybody who is an AADMM member receives a background check. I’ll add that you don’t have to be an AADMM member to be a CDMM.
CM: Are daily money managers insured and bonded?
Being insured and bonded is not a requirement, to my knowledge. Our company is insured. To me, that is important. I want to tell our current and potential clients that if we mess up, we have insurance that’s going to cover the mistake we made. It will make the clients whole.
Daily money managers oversee personal daily money matters such as bills, budgets and recordkeeping. The actual services they provide vary by the daily money manager and the needs of each client, but their services generally include:
CM: When you start acting as a daily money manager for someone, do you ever run into a situation where you see a lot of problems or mistakes?
We certainly have. There’s one client we started with just two or three years ago. She seemed like she was really aware of what was going on, but there were indications that she was making choices that were not necessarily good. As time went on, it was determined she had dementia, and she’s now in a care facility.
There are red flags we might see that alert us. Subscriptions to 15 different magazines, clients getting phone calls that say, “Buy this” and buying it, things like that.
We’ve certainly had clients who have progressed from being fully there to less there. We’ve needed to talk to their power of attorney more frequently and verify things that are going on. We’ve also had clients, at any age, who have trouble managing their money and/or overspending. We can make recommendations, give suggestions, put together a spending plan, monitor and alert them to what’s going on. But unless a daily money manager is also certified as a money therapist or something else, we don’t cross that boundary. There are daily money managers who have different certifications.
At the end of the day, we can’t tell somebody, “We are taking your money away from you. You can’t handle the money, so you can’t have it.” We can’t do that, and we don’t want to do that.
CR: Are there certain warning signs that a person needs help? Can problems be identified before someone signs up for 15 magazine subscriptions or runs up shopping bills?
Falling for scams is one. There are various things that people might notice. A person’s family starts to notice stacks of bills that have been pushed off to the side. Alternatively, someone in the family gets a notice and finds out that their loved one hasn’t paid their utility bill for several months.
In terms of actual dementia, one thing I have observed is that when a client seems unusually paranoid, it is often a little sign of the beginnings of dementia.
CR: I’ve seen dementia-related paranoia about money firsthand. In terms of transitioning the management of personal finances, are there things people can do to ease the process?
The first thing that we would do if meeting with a client is find out what their concerns are and why they contacted us in the first place.
One thing I have seen is clients who feel like they must have everything in order to give it to us. This line of thought causes things to keep getting worse because if they don’t have time or capacity to put it in order in the first place, they’re not going to do it in the next few weeks or months. So, I think it’s better for the clients to find a daily money manager.
They will need to find a daily money manager that they feel comfortable with. They will need to look at the AADMM website, check the references and ask if the daily money manager has insurance. When they meet with a prospective daily money manager, they should assess their compatibility with that person because they will need to let the daily money manager get in and find out all the details and put things together. The entire process may take a little bit of time, but it’s important to be thorough.
If somebody has been managing everything and things are organized, it’s easy to turn control over to a daily money manager. But once it starts to get out of control, I don’t think it’s going to get back under control without getting some help.
CR: When you step in, do you usually come with a checklist? How do you walk into a situation where, obviously, everyone has different methods?
We have basic checklists for general things. Then it’s the digging and the onion peeling. It’s asking, “What are your bank accounts? What are your credit cards? What are your insurance policies? What are your monthly bills?”
We then collect all the documents we can and get access to our clients’ bank accounts, utility bills, etc. We get access to all that stuff so we can see all of that information.
We have a document that outlines the things we need access to and what we’re going to do with that access. The client signs that before we get that access. Then sometimes we discover other things. We know that they have an American Express card, and suddenly we see a payment to a Visa card. We didn’t know about the Visa card. So, then it’s a matter of finding the Visa card. Those things happen.
There is an interview process to collect information. We use it to understand what’s going on. Then, we get access to the client’s major bank accounts, and we track them. Most daily money managers use Quicken but some use QuickBooks. Some may use some other products or some other method. But once you start to track the finances and you see the patterns, then you can start to uncover other things you didn’t know about. There can always be surprises.
CR: Just a quick point of clarification: How do you get access to the bank accounts?
The clients give us access. The bank does not give us any access.
A key step to take before hiring any financial professional is to determine whether they and their firm are right for you. Here are some of the questions the American Association of Daily Money Managers (AADMM) suggests asking.
CR: How would you suggest family members go about approaching the topic of monitoring parents’ finances without infringing on the parents’ feeling of independence?
That is such a tricky thing. One of the reasons why people hire daily money managers is that they may not want their children to know their financial matters. This is much more common than you may think. As a daily money manager, we ask our clients what they do and do not want other people to know. They are our client and we follow their direction.
I think children of older adults should tread very lightly. I didn’t know anything about my parents’ finances. Part of that is generational. I’m much more open with my daughter than my parents were with me. I would have no problem with my daughter asking me what was going on and sharing the information. But that wasn’t as common back in the day, so it just depends. There can be other family dynamics such as siblings not always agreeing.
I think the daily money manager in those kinds of situations must first honor the client’s wishes. They can help the client see that the kids need to be comforted about things being okay. Depending on what the client wants, the daily money manager may have some meetings with the family to share appropriate information and reassure them that their loved one is being looked after.
But if you’re asking about what someone can do before their parents have outside help, I think the main thing is to observe what’s going on with their parents. If they visit them regularly, they can see if there are signs that something needs to happen. The children can ask if their parents have a power of attorney and a will. But beyond that, it gets really tricky.
CR: If somebody has an older parent and they want to ensure the parent’s wishes are being followed once signs of significant cognitive decline appear, what guidance could you offer?
Having that power of attorney discussion before somebody needs it is preferable. If you know there’s a power of attorney and you become concerned about the person’s capacity, then you can talk to the power of attorney and say, “I’m concerned. What do we need to do?”
You can also try to talk to the parents to see if they’re willing to get help. You can approach them until it gets to the point where the power of attorney has to step in and say they need help.
The more that can be done before the power of attorney has to step in, the better. This is particularly important because if a person is already paranoid, it is hard to talk to them about somebody else helping them with their money.
CR: Do you have any suggestions on how people can simplify their finances as they get older?
The more they can automate, the easier it will be for them. Assuming they have the wherewithal to do so, have the necessary monthly bills automatically paid to simplify what’s going on.
That’s one of the first things a daily money manager will do. If a client does not have things on automatic payment, we’ll put them on automatic payment.
The double-edged sword is, of course, a person’s ability to do things online. It can be challenging. I work with an older adult who does not know how to use a computer, and I can’t get her set up for a Social Security account unless she can sit in front of a computer and complete the necessary steps. That same client has a cell phone without texting capability because she doesn’t want texts. Many institutions today can’t do anything unless they can send a text, so we can’t resolve her issues.
Technology is very troublesome for many seniors, and it’s frustrating that people don’t seem to recognize how difficult that can be.
The conversation continues in AAII Retirement Investing. Marbury explains to how find a daily money manager and what you can expect to pay for their services.
PRISM Wealth-Building Process
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