FAQ

Who are you and can I trust you?  

Wealth benchmarks is an independent non-institutional and non-governmental service. We don’t share individual or optional contact information and users participate on an anonymous basis. Our mission is to i) increase financial literacy and get people more interested in their finances, ii) help professionals demonstrate the value of advice to their clients and iii) expand the knowledge about wealth. Please read All About Us and Privacy for more information.

How might this help me (individuals, couples)?

Periodically taking inventory of "what you own, owe, are worth, earn, spend, save and insure" is a key part of managing your finances - our Analysis and Tracking reports do that for you. Understanding the make up and size of things like your debt, savings and insurances relative to your overall position, your income, your expenses, etc... helps you better understand your position and may hint at some of your priorities - our unique finance ratios do that for you. A curiosity to compare yourself to others may just be the "hook" that gets you to spend some needed time looking at your finances. Comparisons may also provide some relief from the "status anxiety" that can come from thinking you aren't as better off as those who live extravagant lifestyles funded by debt or at the expense of savings - our comparison tools helps you in both cases. Lastly our comprehensive Analysis report should help you have a more productive discussion with your current or prospective financial advisor, accountant, solicitor, insurance expert, mortgage broker or bank representative.    

How might this help me and my clients (financial professional)?

Our Professionals Analysis and Comparison report can help you explain to existing and prospective clients key aspects about their wealth and uncover opportunities for improvement. This could be a great way to reinvigourate relationships or start new ones. Some advisors report using our Individuals report to also help clients track their wealth over time.  

Who else might find this service useful?

Accountants might find this a useful service to add greater value to their clients including reviewing our indicative financial statements and measures. Solicitors may appreciate this information to help implement an asset protection or estate planning strategy. Someone helping you apply for finance might appreciate seeing your financial position comprehensively laid out. Of course, in all these circumstances, the quality of information depends on the quality of your inputs – we do not warrant the accuracy of the information provided.

Can you give me advice about what my data means and what I should do?

Sorry, no. By law we are not allowed to provide you advice. In our commentary, we are careful to not infer what are “right” or “wrong” answers for individuals. Indeed, there are none - everyone’s circumstances vary. We recommend that you speak to your/a financial advisor, banker or accountant to discuss your personal circumstances. We think the Analysis report is a wonderful tool for you to take with you for such a discussion. For general information, please also refer to our many hints and comments. You can also refer to our “User Guide” (under development) and Links to a number of websites that offer quality educational material.   

Can I link this service to my website?

We encourage you to make others aware of this service including by putting a link on your website. Large distribution and/or advisory group users are welcome to enquiry about a co-branded facility for use by their clients (available at extra cost). 

Where do the comparisons come from?

Comparison data available to registered users comes from 1000's of previous site users. Our Quick Check tool uses data provided by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. Their information derives from in-home surveys done with a broad selection of Australian households and other sources like the census.  

How do you protect the quality of the data?

We rely foremost on honest behaviour of  the majority of users, however, we have a number of undisclosed design features and data validation techniques to eliminate non-representative information. The collection of information this way is unique and a community experiment. We believe anonymous data entry allows this facility to grow the fastest and gain participation from those who wouldn’t normally provide their, or all of their, information. We do not set out to replace the services of others who undertake an important cross-Australia statistical analysis. While we can cross-check our information to such sources, our comparisons will be more relevant to groups of users with similar characteristics, not necessarily to the country as a whole. 

We hope to cover our costs and fund improvements to this service from i) sponsorship, ii) preparation of reports used by professionals commercially and iii) the sale of publications. To date we have avoided pop-up and banner advertisements. Please support us so we can continue to do so.  

I live overseas, can I use this service?

International visitors should use our international site www.wealthbenchmarks.com . There all features available on the Australian site are availabe as well as country specific tax calculations. 

If there are any other questions not covered in our documentation, please contact us.