Meet Fred – A Windrush Success Story!

This is an interesting story about Fred, who’d come over from Jamaica on the Windrush when he was a teenager.  As you can imagine, he arrived with absolutely nothing and yet he’d manage to build up a significant investment portfolio independently with very little advice.  When he contacted me, he had recently retired and wanted some pension advice.  His son was already a client of mine, so he got in touch.

A Full Financial Review

The first thing that I did was to conduct a full, financial review.  With my findings, I recommended that he make some adjustments to his portfolio, and I was delighted when he agreed.

Trips Abroad and Cars

I’d also done some cash flow models on Fred’s investments and the results showed that he had accumulated more than enough to live a good retirement, doing the things he wanted to do.  One of his dreams was to return back home to Jamaica to see his family.  He also had plenty of money to buy a new car, whenever he wanted, driving and cars were one of the hobbies that he enjoyed!

I really enjoyed Fred’s company; he was such a lovely gentleman.  So much so that our meetings often went on for a long time because he was always very jolly with great conversation!  I will never forget our last meeting.  He came to see me when he was terminally ill with cancer and bought my team and I a small gift to thank us for all of our help over the years.  It was an emotional parting, and we all had tears in our eyes when he said goodbye.

Making Something from Nothing

Some might say that Fred was successful because he had accumulated his wealth from nothing, but I think that it’s far more important that he’d embraced life and was a wonderful person to spend time with.  Believe me, over the years I’ve met many people with money who tend to be unhappy, but Fred was in an entirely different category!

Unfortunately, Fred’s story isn’t one with a happy ending because after his passing, his children argued and quarrelled about his money.  Some of them still don’t speak to this day, over ten years later.  However, I am pleased to say that Fred’s son is still my client and we met only recently, sharing our experiences of his dad over a cup of tea (along with giving some sound financial advice too!).