By Weld Royal
Doug Messina learned about planning for the worst in childhood. "My parents didn't have a lot of money," Messina explains. "Blue-collar family. My father was a construction worker, didn't go to college. My mom stayed home with us for a number of years and became an art teacher." His family inherited a small amount of money, but it was poorly managed. Then came calls from the bank, every night. He worried the family's house would go into foreclosure. "I just remember thinking...we've got to figure this money thing out," says Messina.
On our latest The Way Forward: Next Generation podcast, Messina, private wealth advisor at Ameriprise Financial Services, talks about how he figured out the "money thing," why it's important to plan for the unexpected, and how he helps clients stay on track.
Lessons from 2008. Messina's views are shaped by more than two decades in financial services. He started out as an analyst, helping to build portfolios, allocate assets, and research alternative investments. His team worked with foundations and endowments. Then in 2008, a few years into his analyst career, the global financial crisis hit. "That humbled me. And I think it humbled just about everyone," he recalls. The global financial crisis pushed Messina to rethink his views on investing, questioning investments that seemed too "complex" or "convoluted.
Creating client relationships. Messina stresses the importance of building strong bonds with clients. For young advisors starting out, he offers the following guidance: First, be honest. Second, be yourself, because people want to work with people they like or people who are like them. Third, put yourself in the client's position and ask whether you would make the same recommendation if you were them.
Strong client relationships can help wealth managers direct conversations. Messina says advisors obviously need to keep up with new products like crypto stay abreast of how various assets are doing. Yet when clients ask questions such as whether they should be buying more gold, he says it is important to ask how those investments fit into a client's plan.
Like many advisors, Messina discusses planning using a time-based bucket analogy. The short-term bucket is for cash reserves and emergency funds. An intermediate-term bucket might cover kids' and grandkids' education. "The long-term bucket is where we can be a little bit more aggressive -- that's IRA and 401(k) money, keeping that all diversified," he points out.
The framework helps to prepare people for market downturns or unexpected events before they happen, according to Messina. As an illustration, he points to a client nearing retirement, whose employer started making noises about layoffs. The client told Messina he wasn't worried because he had been there a long time. Then he got laid off.
Turning a job loss into a new adventure. Messina met with the client and his wife and could see the couple had plenty of cash set aside and didn't need to make rash decisions. Messina then offered a surprising idea. He recalled the couple loved to travel to a particular country in Southeast Asia and proposed they consider an extended trip there. "Why don't we build into the plan that you move there for a little while?" Messina proposed.
Messina showed the couple how they could rent out their house in the U.S. and live comfortably by managing expenses even if the husband never worked again. "Within a week, I got an email from him, and he said, 'We just bought a one-way ticket there,' and they've been there ever since," Messina says. "They love it."
This content was created by Barron's, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. Barron's is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
December 18, 2025 16:27 ET (21:27 GMT)
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