Living longer, more women sharpen skills for investing

We all know women live longer than men.

That’s what the actuarial tables say, anyway. (Just in case you’re curious, the average life expectancy for women was 80 in 2007, and for men, it was 75.)

With that in mind, Peter Braun, a financial adviser at UBS Financial Services Inc. in Boulder and other Boulder area wealth managers recommend that all of you women reading this are going to need to save more money than your male counterparts if you want to live comfortably in your golden years.

We may have heard this before, but it doesn’t hurt to hear it again – especially as more women take more responsibility for managing their own funds.

After 17 years of offering money-management seminars specifically for women in Boulder, Denver and Vail, Braun sees some trends.

He says that unlike a lot of the men he sees, the women aren’t afraid to ask questions about their retirement funds. They’re not afraid to hear about the basics of money management, even if they’ve heard it before.

Braun starts at the beginning, discussing the definition of a stock, a bond, a mutual fund, etc. He then discusses the importance of deciding on appropriate asset allocation between higher risk and lower risk strategies.

With an estimated 70 percent of all consumer dollars spent in the United States spent by women, it makes sense that they’re interested in where their money goes for retirement. Braun points out that a higher percentage of women than men are now graduating from law schools and medical schools. The number of female chief executive officers at companies in the United States has more than doubled in the last 10 years.

“Things have changed over time. Women feel more empowered now, and they feel they should know about investing,” Braun said.

And – not to stereotype, or anything – women tend to turn their portfolios over less often than men do and to trade less frequently, Braun said. That’s just one strategy that money managers say can build wealth.

Women understand bargains, they understand sales, and that makes them better as investors as well, Braun said. In general, women seem to have more patience than men do when it comes to investing, based on national studies, he said.

“I see a lot of the same questions from people trying to understand what investing is all about,” Braun said. “To be a long-term investor, you have to be in the market when the market is good and when it’s not as good.”

Over at BSW Wealth Partners in Boulder, about 30 percent of the clientele are women investors, said Debi Baydush, a founder and partner of the firm, along with Drew Simon and Ben Weaver. Female clients range the gamut, from women who are suddenly single, either from death or divorce, to women who are in charge of trust funds for their families, Baydush said.

The number of female investors has risen as more women come into their own, financially, and as traditional gender roles get knocked down, Baydush said.

In addition, many of the firm’s clients are families with educated wealth, and parents want to educate all of the children about the assets, not just the boys, she said. BSW offers one adviser who focuses specifically on women.

Putting it in reverse

On a somewhat related note:

Wells Fargo Bank has decided to stop offering reverse-mortgage loans – a decision that potentially could affect every retired woman in the United States.

Reverse mortgages are most commonly taken out by older couples who already have paid off their homes. The thought is that homeowners can use the equity in their homes to have money to live on in their retirement years. A bank then recoups the cost of the mortgage by selling the house and taking the proceeds when the homeowner dies.

The program is ending because of the current uncertainty in the residential real estate market, Wells Fargo said in a statement.

While the bank doesn’t report on its activity in specific regions of the country, about 1.2 percent of all mortgage volume at Wells Fargo in 2010 nationwide came from reverse mortgages, said Cristie Drumm, a Wells Fargo spokeswoman based in Denver.

Even though Wells Fargo doesn’t offer the reverse-mortgage option anymore, bankers will still offer things like home-equity loans to seniors as well as other loans, Drumm said.

Bank of America also ended its reverse-mortgage program this year. The two other major national mortgage lenders – JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup – don’t offer the product. Wells Fargo and Bank of America will continue to service existing reverse-mortgage loans.

Beth Potter can be reached at 303-630-1944 or email bpotter@bcbr.com.

on Facebook on LinkedIn