Hartlepool-born Harrison Smith is a financial adviser based in his hometown’s Greenbank business centre and is associated with Emerald Associates. Harrison offers an insight into money matters in an exclusive monthly column for North East Connected.
Like the start of any new year, 2025 is full of new opportunities for everyone. Whether you’re young, old, or have a passion burning inside of you, there will be something you are hoping to achieve this year.
Take me for example. This is the year when I’m determined to get back playing golf to a “good” standard again. I’m desperate to return to a decent level again, one where I at least know the direction a golf ball will be heading can be handy!
What’s prompted this? In mid-December I finally got an email I have been waiting for over the last 18 months – my membership application at the brilliant Seaton Carew Golf Club had been accepted.
It’s nice to be a member of a golf club again, particularly one that is full of friends and family, and one that I know has been very progressive in recent years.
When I first got back from university in South Carolina a few years ago, I was sick of football, having played six days a week for four years over the course of a scholarship.
Football had beaten me up and, if I am honest, I had lost a lot of passion for the game, so I turned to golf.
I joined Hartlepool Golf Club with my uncle another excellent course in this area. From there it was relentless rounds of golf whenever time allowed.
My handicap dropped quickly, but reaching single figures presented a new challenge, as most amateur golfers will know. After 18 months without a club, waiting for the email from Seaton Carew, and not playing anywhere near as much as I would have liked, my standards have dropped significantly. However, this is the year that I do something about it.
I have a fresh start, at a new club. I have been playing off 8.3 now for three years and my ambition is to try to get that down to five. That’s a tough ask around a challenging links like Seaton Carew GC!
There’s a wider point to this because golf relates quite nicely to what I do for a living. Nobody has ever played a perfect round of golf. It would be hard to even define a perfect round. Would it be 18 hole-in-ones?
It’s like trying to define the perfect financial plan because I also don’t think that exists. Even if we would all like to think it does.
Just like golf, you will encounter unexpected challenges. Life, like a walk down the fairway (if
you are lucky enough to be on the fairway) or an approach to the green, can push you in different directions, maybe some areas that you weren’t quite anticipating.
Golf is not about how brilliant your best shot was, it is about how you react to the bad shots into the pond, the setbacks.
Given these challenges on the course, even the best golfers in the world recognise the value of having a caddie. Financial planning is more difficult with only one set of eyes. If your financial planning, like my golf game, needs some direction then take yourself to see a financial adviser.
The start of the year is always a very apt time to take that step and get some clarity and direction on where your financial future is heading.
We all have different aspirations, but whether that is that you are looking to retire, paying for university fees or accommodation, or even helping someone else, then it is important that you are planning for them all. Whatever your situation.
My door is always open – or even if you want to join me on the golf course for a quick chat, but fair warning, it could be a long round at the moment!
*For further information or to book an appointment with Harrison check out his Adviser hub https://linktr.ee/harrisonsmithea [linktr.ee] [linktr.ee [linktr.ee]