Alison Griffiths on Lang & O'Leary Exchange

Interview with Alison starts at 47 min. and 30 sec. into the video

The first thing I want to talk about the interview is what she had to say about using advisors.  In her words, "Very few advisors add value to most investors."  She isn't saying advisors never provide value, but that few do, most of the time.  She also said up to 75% of the portfolios of people she talks to are in the negative position!  Even if it is only 50%, that means the average advisor is making more money than the average investor!  She says that, "Advisory services are about selling product."  Of course, Kevin O'Leary disagrees, and he isn't the only one who compares investing to brain surgery.  I agree with Alison - it doesn't need to get that complicated!  Again, advisors and people like Kevin want us to believe that so they can sell us more product.

Alison says "Don't buy junk."  I agree, stick to quality.  We don't get more RRSP contribution room because we lost money buying junk.  She also makes the point that depending on how much money you have saved, GIC's (guaranteed investment certificates) might even work (despite losing to inflation).  She recommends we  forget mutual funds (too expensive); buy broadly based exchange traded funds (ETF's), instead.  Keep it simple - we don't need a lot of product.

When asked about yield she failed to mention REIT's.  There are ETF's which consist of Real Estate Income Trusts.  Globeinvestor.com shows the yield of iShare's XRE as 4.8%.

I haven't read her book, but I may do just that after seeing the interview!

Are you a fan of what Alison Griffiths is telling us?