Fighting Cancer’s ‘Financial Aftershocks’

Yeske Buie has long supported the Foundation for Financial Planning, the nation’s only nonprofit charity solely devoted to supporting the delivery of pro bono financial planning. The Foundation’s most recent initiative, Pro Bono for Cancer, works to match financial planners like us with families whose lives have been upended with the terrible news of a cancer diagnosis. This important work is quickly gaining attention across the profession, and was recently highlighted in an article by Financial Planning Magazine contributor, Graison Dangor, titled “Fighting Cancer’s ‘Financial Aftershocks’”.

Below is an excerpt from the article that shares the experience of partner Yusuf Abugideiri, CFP® who has worked with three pro bono for cancer families over the past year. For more, check out the entire article here and learn more about the ways that others in the financial planning profession are contributing to this initiative.

‘TO ME, THAT’S BEING A FIDUCIARY’

For clients fighting cancer, the stream of expenses can seem endless, says Yusuf Abugideiri, a partner with Yeske Buie, which has offices in San Francisco and Vienna, Virginia. Over the last year, Abugideiri and an assistant have worked with three families to develop a financial plan, meeting with each by phone four or five times. Each discussion takes him and his assistant three to four hours of prep work.

“It’s not insignificant,” says Abugideiri, who is based in the firm’s Virginia office, but “it’s some of the most fulfilling and rewarding work that we do.”

It’s work that gives him perspective on his own challenges. When he was matched with his second client a week before Thanksgiving, the task seemed impossible to fit in his packed end-of-year schedule.

The client was the father of a 13-year-old boy with cancer. In comparison, his problems seemed small.

At the time, Abugideiri was also a new father. His own son had not yet turned 1.

“I’m just sitting here trying to imagine being this boy’s father,” he says. “How do you say no?”

“If it was me, I would need someone to help me and I would hope that someone could,” he says. “To me, that’s being a fiduciary. Putting yourself in the client’s shoes and [giving] what that person needs.”