Kay Aarons

Director & Financial Planner

Kay is the Principal of Strategic Financial Solutions and a qualified financial planner with 20 years’ experience in the profession.

As the head of SFS, Kay’s role is to manage the business, including investment strategy and selection, and the expectations of our clients and compliance with ASIC rules. In addition to these responsibilities, Kay has a substantial day-to-day hands-on involvement with individual clients, helping them define their financial goals and delivering strategies to achieve them.

Kay holds a Bachelor of Economics and Politics from Monash University. She completed her Diploma of Financial Planning and achieved Certified Financial Planner status in 1996. Before this, Kay also spent many years owning and operating retail businesses.

Kay established Strategic Financial Solutions in 1995 and in December 2002, acquired the business of Investwell, a city based practice of similar size to SFS. The combined business is one of the largest single-office boutique financial planning groups in Melbourne. Six years on, successful integration of the businesses, and ongoing attention to customer satisfaction, has resulted in approximately 80% of Investwell’s clients remaining with Strategic Financial Solutions.

Kay’s long experience and accumulated expertise means that she is able to help a wide range of people; from turning around the financial fortunes of those who most need financial help to managing complex financial portfolios for capable professionals who don’t have the time to do it themselves.

Kay has helped to turn around the lives of many people who find themselves in desperate need of financial help. For example, a professional management consultant found his situation in a mess following the death of his wife. Debts had piled up and tax returns were not completed. Kay’s plan included a good diversity of investment assets and tax strategies to reduce company and personal debt and free up cash flow to fund super. Four years on, the client has $500K in super, the company debt is cleared, the accounts are in capable hands with a new accountant referred by Kay, and the business is growing strongly.

Kay also excels when managing the finances of those at the other end of the financial scale; capable professionals who simply don’t have the time to do this themselves. For example, a professional couple came to SFS in need of a financial plan to match their life plan, which included children. Following Kay’s advice, the couple has now completely paid out their home loan, has a significant investment portfolio, a private school education plan for their children, and effective tax planning that makes the most of their incomes and cashflow.

In her spare time, Kay enjoys fitness-related pursuits including gym, bike riding and football. She loves reading and is a well-known news junkie who will happily recount current events to any members of staff who will listen. Kay has two grown children and is hoping (not very subtly) for grandchildren one day.

Paul Jones

Financial Planner

Paul is a Senior Financial Planner with Strategic Financial Solutions. His role is to help our clients define their financial goals and deliver the most appropriate strategies to achieve them.

Paul holds a Bachelor of Science (Chemistry and Biochemistry) from Melbourne University and an MBA from RMIT University and had a long career in the chemicals industry before changing direction to become a financial planner. Paul completed a Graduate Diploma in Financial Planning through the Securities Institute of Australia in 2003 and obtained Certified Financial Planner status the following year. He joined SFS in April 2007 after working with Winchcombe Carson/Capstone Financial Planning in paraplanning and financial planning roles and two years establishing his own financial planning business within an accounting practice.

Paul’s role as a financial planner involves working with SFS clients to determine investment objectives and strategies and continually reviewing and improving these strategies to ensure they achieve the best results.

The value of Paul’s work can be seen in his ability to create innovative strategies to deliver surplus cash flow for clients, even in difficult financial circumstances. For example, a couple were primarily reliant on the wife’s income - though her husband earned a small wage - when she unexpectedly became ill. Her sick leave was quickly exhausted. As she had just turned 55, Paul suggested converting her superannuation into a pension and drawing income from it to supplement her husband’s wage and meet ongoing costs of living, including servicing debt.

In another case, Paul was able to help a high-earning couple to create wealth and reduce debt through an innovative investment strategy. The couple, who had a combined income of $250,000, also had a $250,000 mortgage. Instead of using their disposable income to directly pay off their loan, Paul suggested investing in shares with borrowed funds that created an interest expense. The interest expense led to a tax refund that the couple were able to use to reduce some of the principal on their home loan. The shares paid dividends, which were also used to pay down debt, and when the value of the shares increased on maturity the couple was able to pay out their home loan entirely.

Paul also helped a teacher, aged 54 and in possession of a defined benefit superannuation scheme, to minimise capital gains on her considerable share portfolio, worth about $200,000. The portfolio carried unrealised capital gains of around $100,000, which the teacher was able to reduce by salary-sacrificing 100% of her income into superannuation and progressively selling down her share portfolio.

In his spare time, Paul coaches a senior womens’ hockey club in Footscray. He also enjoys swimming, cycling and good food and wine.

Justin Lip

Financial Planner

Justin is a Financial Planner with Strategic Financial Solutions. His role at SFS is to provide proactive strategic advice to existing clients as well as develop referral relationships with other professionals including lawyers and accountants.

Justin first arrived at SFS in 2004, strongly recommended by one of our staff. He quickly established valued relationships with our clients who grew to depend on him for his advice and expertise, initially as a paraplanner and later as an adviser.

Justin had previously worked at Deloitte’s Financial Services and Investwell Australia as a paraplanner for two years. In these roles, Justin developed systems and templates to streamline work flows, a skill we quickly appreciated at SFS.

After three years in the Singapore army, Justin arrived in 1993 as a student and fell in love with the life here. Justin completed a Bachelor of Business [Eco & Fin] from RMIT with a major in Financial Planning. He is currently in the process of completing his CFP.

Justin’s role as a financial planner with SFS involves working with our clients to determine their investment objectives and strategies.

For three years from 2007, Justin worked for ANZ, as a financial planner in Box Hill and then the Melbourne CBD where he excelled at providing solutions for clients under stress from the Great Financial Crisis.

Initially, he was given the opportunity to develop a network of Asian clients for the bank using his skills in Mandarin and Cantonese.

During this time, Justin also looked after a group of private wealth clients providing them with holistic investment solutions to meet their objectives. In this role, he was working the Private Bank to develop solutions for recent skilled business
migrants from Asia.

The value of Justin’s advice is to provide strategic solutions, particularly for our younger clients.

In one case, Justin helped clients in their 30’s who had a need for insurance as they had a significant mortgage and young children. Typically, this couple had limited cash flow. Justin was able to restructure their insurances to transfer the ownership and payment of premiums from their own pockets to their superannuation funds. This strategy enabled the couple to continue their approach of reducing their home loan as quickly as possible without compromising their life insurance cover. A win all round.

Justin has also developed relationships with our clients’ accountants to ensure that our clients get the best possible outcomes for them.

In his spare time, what little there, is helping his wife Monica look after their three children. Justin loves playing games with the kids and taking the older two for bike rides. He also loves to cook in the weekend for the family, experimenting with new recipes.