The future is female. Over time, more and more of America’s wealth is shifting into women’s hands — and financial planners will need to know how to advise them.
Today wealth has a severe gender gap. In 2020, according to research by McKinsey & Company, women controlled only about one-third of the nation’s household wealth — a total of $10.9 trillion.
But times are changing. First of all, women tend to live five years longer — and are, on average, two years younger — than their husbands. So as male baby boomers pass away, many of their wives will take control of the family finances. Meanwhile, it’s simply becoming more common for women to have this kind of control — from 2015 to 2020, 30% more married women made financial and investment decisions.
By 2030, McKinsey estimated, American women will control close to $30 trillion.
“Attracting and retaining female customers will be a critical growth imperative for wealth management firms,” McKinsey wrote in the study. “To succeed, firms will need to deeply understand women’s differentiated needs, preferences and behaviors when it comes to managing their money.”
And many of these women will be single. According to the Pew Research Center, 28% of U.S. women are widowed, divorced or unmarried — and that number rises to 39% among women aged 65 and older.
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That’s a lot of single women who will need financial advice — and a $30 trillion opportunity for wealth managers. How can advisors serve these investors’ particular needs, strengths and weaknesses? Financial planners from across the country offered their advice.
“One of the biggest advantages of a single woman client is that they are not able to defer decisions to a partner,” said Danika Waddell, founder of Xena Financial Planning in Seattle. “I love helping those women gain confidence and feel empowered — and that’s often much easier to do when they are single.”
Here’s how to advise single female clients, according to the advisors who work with them: