Bio
Samantha Geelan,
Senior Financial Adviser & Aged Care Specialist™
Years in financial services: 28 years
The role in a nutshell:
I’m a financial adviser specialising in aged care and complex advice, assisting and empowering people to effectively manage a variety of transition periods. My work can involve everything that financial advisers do including super, retirement and other financial matters, whilst addressing complex financial and lifestyle obstacles in a holistic way. My focus is to achieve that person’s wishes wherever possible and provide support and guidance to overcome obstacles encountered.
Navigating the aged care realm can be a minefield. Our goal is to take the burden off you as soon as you walk through the door by empowering you with information, support and guidance, including:
Relevant solutions to remain supported in your home,
Guidance on how to access government supports, packages and care options available
What to consider when choosing to enter an aged care facility
Options for funding upfront and ongoing aged care costs
How your and assets and / or income are assessed for Care fees and Centrelink entitlements
Every situation is so unique, and a big part of our role can be to liaise with services such as Centrelink, Department of Human Services (Care Fee assessment), and My Aged Care (Home Care) on behalf and with our clients. We do a lot of work around advocacy too, giving a voice to people who feel they have lost it due to factors such as overwhelm with the complexity of government systems, elder abuse or ageism.
What I do is quite rare in the industry yet fills such a big need. We receive many word-of-mouth referrals that I have also trained other professionals in how to navigate the minefield that is the aged care system. Our clients appreciate the fact that we really care about them and will persevere until we get the outcome they need.
Why you love working in Rethink your Workspace and with Rethink Aged Care:
It is a privilege to work in an environment surrounded by supportive, educated, collaborative and passionate staff who really care for our clients. We operate in a collaborative approach, with client's existing professional advisers and authorised support persons. With our client's authority, we communicate the strategies developed, providing opportunity for efficient implementation of our recommendations, reducing client and family stress or confusion. A benefit of our co-workspace is, if I’m working with a client and they need legal advice, we can source immediate help, rather than asking them to go away and book an appointment with another business before we can proceed. This is a very unique workplace, and everything we do, is for the benefit of our client.
I also love the working environment; it’s very open plan and the cafe is amazing. It’s very unique with the meeting rooms designed to write straight onto the walls, you can see your client conversations and aspirations come alive on the walls during our discovery sessions.
Advice you wish everyone knew:
I wish everyone knew that we offer discovery sessions charged at professional hourly rates, with no obligation for additional services that provide answers to the burning issues a client may have, whilst allowing us to gain an understanding of an individual or family's circumstances and uncovering any personalised complexities that exist in that unique situation. These sessions tend to provide immediate clarity, outline future trigger events that require future advice or support or critical matters that require immediate attention that we can either direct support or refer to other industry professionals that can, eg. Legal or Accounting. Our client's feedback is that they feel empowered to make decisions and hold a greater understanding of what to do next, after our discovery sessions.
I also wish that people knew that knowledge is empowerment when it comes to all things financial, home and aged care. The importance of having a plan before an incident occurs may mean you have the ability to stay in your home with government-funded support.Like insurance, you need to do it well in advance. Although the Home care package waitlist reduced since the 2020 Budget funding increase, immediate allocation of government support via a Home Care Package remains unlikely. If you plan and get things in place before it’s too late, then you will always have the options to choose from and empowered with the knowledge you now have to make an informed decision.
I also wish everyone knew that by admitting you need assistance; this isn’t the same as saying you can’t take care of yourself. You are always in control. When it comes to aged care, you don’t have to have a huge amount of money to be able to bring an aged care specialist on - you may need to have the money to pay the fees, but the amount you save in the long run means that the majority of the time that people have made back the cost of the services in the first six months.
Best career moment:
Helping a client to feel supported to achieve their goals of being independent, stay at home or have an early retirement. I love it when clients tell us ‘we couldn’t have done it without you’ and I am able to remind them that they did it themselves, we only provided the support. We are not traditional financial advisers here, we are much more client-centric.
What you are passionate about:
What we do here is so much bigger than me. I feel grateful that I get to make a difference in our clients’ lives, as that can be such a rare thing.
I love to be able to tell people they can focus on what their loved one wants and leave us, as the experts, to handle the financial issues that are weighing them down. It makes me so happy to see that instant relief, and then be able to help solve their issue and remove the emotional baggage.
For many people, their greatest asset is their house. Our clients sometimes arrive so fearful, but it’s amazing to be able to take on this big burden for them and show them they may be able to stay at home or keep their home, if they really want.
The reason I got into this speciality 10 years ago is that I had clients saying “Why can’t anyone help? Why is there no one who can help us?” These people, who are each dealing with health issues, supporting spouses or their extended families as well as juggling work / carer commitments in their own occupations, needed support and a solution to allow them to focus on their own important professions – such as saving lives or providing support to the family or community, so it feels good to be able to handle this for them. We don’t simply aim to provide a service; we aim to provide exceptional services and reduce life's stresses.
One of your biggest inspirations:
The team at Snowy Owl Sled Dogs and their director, Connie. I had the pleasure of working for a year in Canada, where I was a kennel assistant for 180 dogs, and that’s where I met my dog, Almost. They are all about humane sledding and making sure the dogs have free runs. They adopt out older dogs and take in dogs from kennels that had been shut down for humanitarian reasons. Connie’s two children (Jereme and Carlin) now run the business and I find what they are doing is so inspirational.
That life experience helped me prove to myself that I had grit, I was capable, I could survive. I met my 'Almost’ when he was two or three. He chose me and he’s the only dog from Snowy Owl who has moved to Australia. He was 15 when he died in 2017, and I will forever be thankful for experiencing that unconditional love and companionship.
Qualifications:
Master of Financial Planning
Graduate Diploma of Financial Planning
Graduate Certificate of Applied Finance
Accredited Aged Care Professional
Accredited FPA Aged Care Specialist
Advanced Diploma of Financial Planning
Foundation Diploma of Financial Planning
Statement in Business Services
Certificate III in Banking
NSW Justice of the Peace
Protecting Seniors and Retirement Clients Masterclass 2020
