NELSON FINANCIAL PLANNING, INC.
WINTER PARK, FLORIDA

, Mr. Nelson’s son-in-law, joined the firm on December 5, 1999. Today, Joel Garris manages the day to day operations of the firm. Our family ownership and operation provides for real independence from any third party or parent entity and makes us unique to other investment firms. All firm decisions, investment properties selections and brokerage functions occur on-site. In addition, the firm hosts Central Florida’s longest running In addition, we review the actual allocation of all of your investments in order to ensure they are properly positioned to generate the necessary retirement income. This allocation is based not only on the underlying performance of the available investment options, but also on an individual’s risk tolerance, time horizon, goals, and objectives. Some of these investments must also be allocated to provide for underlying growth in order to keep up with inflation in retirement. This is particularly important because retirees often experience a higher rate of inflation than the general public due to their consumption of health care. We’re Here to Help! Our Philosophy Our most important policy is that no client will invest in anything that we do not own personally. Our investment and retirement income philosophy is grounded on two fundamental principles – diversification and consistency. Diversification is one of the keys to investment and retirement success over time. The old adage of don’t put all your eggs in one basket certainly applies to your investments and your retirement income. We believe proper diversification includes a broad allocation to all asset classes with a particular emphasis on large blue chip dividend paying companies. These are the companies that make the goods, products and services that you and the rest of the world need every day. While this never makes your investments immune from decline, we believe that tomorrow the world will wake up, brush their teeth, get dressed, get a cup of coffee, shower with soap and shampoo, get gas in their cars and go about their normal routines consuming products made by companies. Mr. Nelson spent over 40 years in the investment business. From 1968 through 1977, he was involved in the development and marketing of limited partnerships, which were registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission in the oil and gas and real estate businesses. From 1977 to 1981, he served as President of the Distributor Division and director of Colonial Management Associates, one of the nation’s largest mutual fund companies. In 1981, he moved to Florida as the Division Vice President of Keystone Massachusetts, Inc., an affiliate of the nation’s oldest corporate trust company and subsidiary of the Traveler’s Insurance Company. Prior to 1968, Mr. Nelson had a number of assignments in Washington D.C. in the Post Office Department and the Lyndon B. Johnson White House. Mr. Nelson is a graduate of Texas A & M University where he received a BS Degree in Electrical Engineering in 1958. He graduated from Harvard Business School in 1960 with a Masters in Business Administration. There are some real economic fundamentals that are helping to drive this upward trend and provide the basis for our continued optimism. First, the major economies of the world are expanding in unison for the first time since the 2008 financial crisis. Second, inflation remains subdued keeping both the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank on the sidelines to leave interest rates unchanged. Third, the U.S. economy is not over leveraged as there has been minimal credit growth over the past 10 years; and the U.S. financial system is better capitalized than it has been in years. Fourth, the stock market is not being driven upward by investor euphoria as $737 billion has been pulled out of equity strategies since the 2008 financial crisis. These concentrated results occurred in a handful of financial, healthcare and energy companies who saw their fortunes reverse dramatically on election night in anticipation of a looser regulatory environment under Trump. The broader markets in 2016 saw minimal earnings and revenue growth (0.1% and 2.2 % respectively) for businesses. Diversification – just like being consistent on your holdings – is a strategy that works well over time to reduce overall portfolio risk. While providing consistent returns, it is not 100% perfect all the time. It has been a while since we have seen this type of phenomena – 17 years in fact. In 1999, a handful of tech companies drove the market to new highs only to fall back to earth in 2000 and 2001. While I don’t believe we are in a 1999 scenario these days, there are certainly some parallels. Regardless, don’t be alarmed by your quarterly statement that you will get next week that will show minimal growth for the quarter. In addition, the international and bond portion of your allocations also worked to undermine the domestic performance. The silver lining there is that your investment allocations are lighter on those asset classes these days. Overall, the year was decent in terms of results and that’s our overall investment goal. Looking ahead to 2017, the consumer appears to be less pessimistic than in prior years based on the past few months of consumer confidence data. This is crucially important for broad economic and market growth as consumer spending accounts for 70% of our economy. In fact, corporate earnings are expected to grow by 12% for 2017 with top line revenue growth of 6%. Meanwhile the average consumer has less debt, more cash and has finally started to experience real wage growth (nearly 4% in 2016) for the first time in years. For these reasons, we are particularly positive for the overall market in 2017. 2016 was a busy year at the office. Our main efforts involved a successful rebrand to Nelson Financial Planning along with continued efforts to ensure the cyber security of your information. We also became active on social media so be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter or Linked In. These outlets also provide an opportunity for broader dissemination of our weekly radio show “Dollars and Sense.” Hearing it live at 9 AM on Sunday at 102.5FM or 540AM can often conflict with church schedules but now it is always available the next day on our website at