I’d had dealings with Cullen Wealth through my engineering business where they‘d handled the corporate pension scheme.

This put me in the fortunate position of having first hand experience of what they were like, having monitored their performance over many years. I‘d seen that even when times were bad, the advice we were given was very good indeed.

I liked their feet on the floor approach – a case of ‘don’t panic Captain Mainwaring’ – and valued their advice to take a long-term view where investments were concerned.

So when we came to sell the business and I retired, I had no hesitation in using them for my personal finances too. Stuart Arnold is my adviser and he’s helped me with my pension planning and overseas investments.

With any financial adviser you usually have to give it a period of several years before you can tell whether their advice is good or bad but as mentioned, I’d seen Cullen Wealth’s work over many years so was very comfortable with their recommendations and was extremely satisfied with the performance of my investments.

I’m now working with them on my long term and estate planning to make sure that we maximise my investments in terms of tax-efficiencies and also get the best benefits for my grown up children.

The financial planning from Cullen Wealth has enabled my wife, Irene, and I to do pretty much what we want, any time we want. We can go travelling, help with the grandkids and indulge our hobbies – I’ve got a couple of vintage cars, a 1931 Humber Snipe and a 1934 McLaughlin Buick, so enjoy spending time on them.

Knowing our financial situation means we know exactly where we need to be and when to keep things in check and to know what emergency funds we have. We’re focusing on setting all our affairs in order so that we know our children will be well looked after when we’re gone. The advice from Cullen Wealth has helped us with that, in terms of insurance policies and death duties. We’ve got the peace of mind that everything is covered.