America First Investment Advisors | Financial Planning & Investment Management in Omaha

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Nick Tesla

über Google

Doing business with this investment advisor was not a good experience for my wife and I and wound up costing us significant amounts of time and money in trying to undo their practices. After an extensive internet search and in person interviews with several other firms in Omaha, my wife and I selected America First Investment Advisors to manage our retirement assets. After only a few months with them, I learned several important facts about their business that were not as advertised. The most important of which is that while they claim to be a fiduciary they are not. When I pointed out to them that their actions were not in my best interest they agreed with me. However, the following day I received a phone call from the Chief Executive Officer and and Chief Compliance Officer, Eric Ball informing me that they do not like 'unhappy' clients and were dismissing my wife and I as clients and were refunding their fees. The following is a list of observations of their business practices after we became clients: They have approximately 250 clients that regardless of age, employment or magnitude of 'wealth', are all invested in the same assets, in approximately the same ratios. My wife and I had five accounts with them; two IRAs, two Roth IRAs and a Brokerage account. All five accounts had the same investments in approximately the same ratio. Further, when the deducted their fee for services, they deducted a portion of their fee from each of our five accounts despite the fact that our joint brokerage account was more than amply funded to pay their fee. Taking their fee from our IRAs forced us to pay an additional tax on their deduction that we would not have otherwise been required to pay, since our RMD had already been taken. Further, it prevents those investments from further tax free growth. This practice, they agreed, is not in my best interest and is in violation of their claim to be a fiduciary. This practice they tell me is applied to all of their clients.