I was raised in a small fishing village in Australia where my parents owned a seafood restaurant and some holiday cottages, we also had a small fishing trawler and Dad and I would go out after fish and shrimp when I was just a young kid. I became enthralled with the ocean from then on, even to the extent that when I went to college I studied Mechanical Engineering with a major in Hydraulics. I worked for the Maritime Services Board of NSW in the Hydraulics Research Station where we designed a large port facility for 150,000 ton tankers in Botany Bay, which is a harbor in Sydney. After many years of research and design and with the project wrapping up I decided to take a year sabbatical from my engineering job with the government so that I could travel around the world.

I like to surf, so, to start my sabbatical I decided to go to Bali Indonesia. I then travelled over to Hawaii on to mainland USA, down to Mexico for a look, then back to the USA. I had extensive ocean experience and was doing some sailing and was offered a position as a navigator on a sailboat. After my navigating experience I arrived back in San Diego and experienced the great climate and the Californian lifestyle, I thought this would be a great place to live, well it turns out I was right, but the big question arose, what was I going to do, my engineering was rather specialized, being similar to what the Army Corps of Engineers does in this country, designing port facilities, rerouting rivers and that sort of thing and after I had been in a bureaucratic position once in my life I didn't relish the thought of going back to that same type of situation. I saw a need for the tropical type of clothing that was manufactured in Indonesia and the end result was that I started an Import/ Export business, designing and manufacturing clothing out of Bali Indonesia and importing back to the USA. The business turned out to be quite successful but after about 4-5 years I was just travelling and spending too much time on the road.

Because I had experience investing in Australia and then the practical experience of running my own business, taking care of the financing, managing and investing the cash flows that were generated, a good friend of mine prompted me to go back to school to get the necessary licenses and education so that I could become a Financial Advisor and that is what I have been doing since 1985. I now have experience in all areas of investing strategies, including the areas of objective management, asset allocation, the analysis of professionally managed investments as well as performance evaluation. I believe that understanding a client’s goals and risk tolerance are the cornerstones of a successful investment strategy and because each investor is an individual with unique needs and circumstances I design a specific portfolio based on information gathered from personal appointments. My investment philosophy is to help my clients protect their principal, preserve their purchasing power and obtain the highest level of total return, including both income and growth of capital consistent with their tolerance for risk.