DIY or Delegate: the Financial Advisor Conundrum w/ Pam Krueger #1055

How to Money

iHeartPodcasts

Education, Business, Investing

4.6 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 29 October 2025

⏱️ 62 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

A financial advisor WON’T magically fix your money problems, but many folks assume that by hiring a professional, they’re well on their way to financial success. Maybe, but maybe not, because a bunch of different factors come into play. And who better to have this discussion with other than award-winning investor advocate and financial educator Pam Krueger. She began her career as a stockbroker before moving into financial media, where she created and co-hosted the PBS series MoneyTrack where her work emphasizes transparency, investor protection, and understanding how advisors are compensated. Pam is also the founder and CEO of Wealthramp, a platform that connects consumers with vetted fiduciary financial advisors and today we discuss:

Determining if you should DIY or delegate
The one silver bullet in everyone’s financial journey
Conflicts of interest and the fiduciary standard
Fee-only advisors, unbiased advice without commissions
Expecting transparency in advisor fees
Paying for “meh” financial advice
Breaking up with an advisor if you’re unhappy
How Wealthramp advisors are vetted and finding the right advisor for you!

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Transcript

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0:00.0	This is an IHeart podcast.
0:04.1	Welcome to How to Money.
0:05.9	I'm Joel.
0:06.6	And today I'm talking DIY or delegate the financial advisor conundrum with Pam Kruger.
0:34.6	Thank you. Okay, so a financial advisor won't fix your money problems. But many folks assume that by hiring a pro, they're well on their way to financial success.
0:42.0	Maybe, maybe not.
0:43.4	That depends on a bunch of different factors that we're going to discuss today.
0:47.5	And if you want to hire an advisor but you're not sure where to start, we're going to talk about that too.
0:52.1	Pam Kruger is an investor advocate. She co-hosted MoneyTrack
0:56.1	on PBS for many years. She's also the founder of Wealthramp.com, which is a really big part of
1:03.7	what we're going to, it's going to enter into this conversation. She cares deeply about helping
1:08.3	individual investors make wise decisions. So Pam, thank you so much for joining me
1:14.1	today on the show. Thank you, Joel. It's a pleasure. So glad to have you here. We connected
1:20.0	last week and I just really enjoyed getting to know you and I was like, oh my gosh, I have to have
1:24.3	Pam to talk about financial advisors because this is one of those
1:27.9	pitfalls that people so often face. But before we get into that, I want to know what you splurge
1:32.9	on, your craft beer equivalent because that's something I'm spending money on fiercely,
1:38.3	even while I'm trying to save and invest for my future. What is, what's your splurge?
1:42.6	I'm trying not to add to any weight around the
1:47.4	middle of the waist. So it's not going to be the beer this time. But I'm telling you last
1:53.7	weekend, I had a real tussle with myself because I want to upgrade my bike. And I'm going to, I was
2:00.6	thinking about trading my bike in.
	...

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