MMA announces new member benefit: financial planning through Sterling Retirement Resources
MINNEAPOLIS, March 11, 2008—Thanks to a new preferred provider agreement by the MMA, Minnesota physicians have access to financial planning that is attuned to their needs, at a special member rate.
Sterling Retirement Resources, Inc., a St. Louis- Park-based financial planning service with experience working with physicians and other health care professionals, will provide MMA members with investment and retirement counsel.
Sterling principals are Joel Greenwald, M.D., who practiced internal medicine in St. Paul for 10 years, and Steve Finkelstein. Both are Certified Financial Planners (CFPs), and both have worked extensively with physicians and other health care providers.
CFP may be considered the best-known and most respected credential for members of the financial planning profession.
Sterling offers a free introductory consulting session, in which members can describe their financial aspirations and questions, and receive practical recommendations at no charge.
Services offered by Sterling Retirement include retirement planning, investment management, estate planning, insurance analysis, and college funding. They work with individuals and families from the beginning of their careers all the way through retirement.
"We begin with a simple conversation," said Finkelstein. "We meet here, or we talk by phone. We want to know where the physician is coming from, and what he or she wants to make happen. This assessment conversation, which is informative to both sides, is absolutely free."
"Physicians are better informed than most people about investment planning," said Greenwald, himself a physician who combined his life interests when he became a financial planner ten years ago. "But there are things many physicians miss. For example, the best way to access your savings when retirement is finally at hand – that can be a tricky business, and we can help with it."
Sterling Retirement Resources is planning a series of informative workshops, complimentary for MMA members, around key investment topics, which will be publicized in MMA Online.