Good advice is the key to unlocking financial freedom for your family

<on-screen> An advisor's impact. Li's story.

<on-screen> Li Han

Li: My name's Li. I'm working in a gaming company as software engineering.

My family has a daughter with 11 years old and a boy 14 years old.

And my husband is also working in the IT department. Network administrator.

My advisor’s name is Renyu.

I've known her for many years, since the first day she came to Canada.

Because I know her husband.

We’re friends for a long time.

So even after she joined Sun Life, becoming my advisor was still a very close friend.

And then we have similar family situation.

She always gave me a very good advice at the right moment.

When my child was just born, she suggested to buy some life insurance.

Or at the early stage of the house, she gave me an insurance for the mortgage.

Some a suggestion about the kids, and also after his retirement.

So I just feel, I will be more, enjoying my family life for my kids and my day-to-day work, too, I think, and you just, give me a very professional advice about that.

I feel my family is well protected.

It's nice to feel that I'm the only client for her.

And she always said I'm her first client, so she always put me on the high priority.

<on-screen> Zelma and Ashley. Chestermere, Alberta.

Zelma: Hi. My name is Zelma.

I moved to Calgary with my husband 28 years ago.

We love it here.

We've been married for 31 years.

We have two kids.

Ashley: We have a very busy life and while the kids were growing up, we found it very tough to balance our finances and to keep track of it.

Zelma: And then one day the doorbell rang, and it was a Blake at the door.

He said “Hi, I’m Blake. I'm your new advisor because your past advisor has retired.”

Ever since then we've been with him because he's so warm.

He’s just like family.

He’s easy to talk to.

He explains everything in detail.

Ashley: It's really important to know that the person you're talking to has the same goals and keeps your goals in mind.

Me and my wife with him thought that I was going to invest in our home where we would bring all the bells and whistles into that house.

And that would be our final dream home.

It backfired on us.

The backfire was we sold our house, we go on vacation and we get a call from the builder saying they're in receivership.

Zelma: So, we were four weeks away from moving and they couldn't complete the house.

And we were left without a home.

Ashley: Blake introduced us to a realtor that helped us a lot.

They helped us find another home.

Zelma: Along the way that it was quite stressful because having no home, having sold our home, we were living out of a rental condo.

All our stuff was in storage.

We were constantly reaching out to Blake, and then we needed funds right away.

We bought this house in 10 days over Christmas.

Blake advised us how we could get our cash out of our savings without any kind of implications.

We listened to his advice.

He's very fast, very efficient, very motivated to help us.

We really appreciate all of that.

<on-screen> It all starts with great advice.

<on-screen> An advisor's impact. Karen's story.

<on-screen> Karen Lawerence.

Karen: I'm Karen and I'm a Northern Ontario girl at heart.

And in 1985, I moved to Toronto to work at an accounting firm to get my CA designation.

During that time, I met my husband, Paul, and we raised three wonderful daughters.

They all graduated with a business degree, but none of them chose the accounting route.

I'm very excited about the next upcoming change in my life. I am going to be retiring at the end of June of this year.

We started with sunlight back in 1997 and our advisor was Rob, and I believe my husband knew Rob in high school and about six years ago now, we were introduced to a business associate of Rob's, Omar.

And the last little while we've transitioned to Omar, and Omar looks after our financial needs at Sun Life now.

We've trusted him with life insurance with RESP, RRSP, term life insurance, medical benefits, tax, free savings accounts.

They've been our advisor for everything, and I think it's an important thing in anyone's life to have an advisor.

Having a financial roadmap has been crucial to our family's life.

My husband's father used Rob for his investments, and when he passed away, my mother-in-law now uses Omar for hers.

So, it's a generational thing.

He genuinely is interested and concerned and always follows up to make sure that where we want to be is where we're going to get.

With his help, I have peace of mind knowing that I am going to be okay for the rest of my life.