About a year ago I asked all of my clients the same question: what do you actually want from me?
Every single one said some version of the same thing:
Help me understand my financial life.
Tell me what to do next.
That's it. Not "run a Monte Carlo simulation." Not "show me a projected net worth at age 87." They wanted to understand what they have, and they wanted to know what to do about it.
I thought about what "understand" really means. It means being able to answer questions. So I started thinking about what questions clients actually need answered about their money.
I came up with 12. I call them the Core Questions of Financial Planning:
Do I have a clear purpose for what I want to use my money for?
Where is my income going?
Do I know what all I own and owe?
Do I have access to enough cash?
Am I saving enough?
Can I replace the things I can't afford to replace?
Will what I want to happen happen when I die?
Do I know how I'll be affected by the Big 8 Threats?
Am I taking the right amount of risk with my investments?
Am I paying more than I need to for debt, insurance, or taxes?
Will I be okay if I become disabled or unemployed?
Do I know what I need to do next?
If you can help a client answer these 12 questions, you've given them a comprehensive financial plan. No projections required.
The second half: what to do next.
Once you've identified where a client stands, the natural output is a set of changes. In my experience, every recommendation falls into one of 5 categories:
Accounts to open, close, or restructure
Changes to cash flow
Changes to insurance
Changes to investment allocation
Changes to documents and procedures
I call these the 5 Types of Changes. They're the action layer of the plan.
Why this works better than projections.
Traditional planning starts with assumptions about the future: inflation rates, market returns, life expectancy. Stack enough assumptions on top of each other and you get a number that feels precise but isn't. Clients either trust it blindly or (correctly) wonder how anyone could possibly know what their portfolio will look like in 30 years.
Kerdora works differently. Instead of projecting forward, we focus on the present: where does your client stand right now against the things that matter? What needs to change? The plan becomes a living set of answers and actions, not a static document built on guesses.
How this shows up in the platform.
Everything in Kerdora is organized around this methodology. The planning modules map to the Core Questions. The changes framework captures the 5 Types of Changes as you work. And Guides let you communicate all of it back to the client in plain language.
The whole workflow is: get data in, work through the planning modules, note changes as you go, and build a guide that helps your client understand their financial life and know what to do next.