Certified Financial Planner - Education Requirements

Education Requirements

To earn the CFP Board designation, candidates must meet several requirements—the first of which is the educational requirement, which requires candidates to have a bachelor's degree or higher from an accredited college or university. As a first step to the present CFP certification criteria, students must master a list of nearly 100 topics on integrated financial planning. The topics cover major planning areas such as:

• General Principles of Finance and Financial Planning
• Insurance Planning
• Employee Benefits Planning
• Investment and Securities Planning
• State and Federal Income Tax Planning
• Estate Tax, Gift Tax, and Transfer Tax Planning
• Asset Protection Planning
• Retirement Planning
• Estate Planning
• Financial planning and consulting

To fulfill the education requirement, students are required to complete course training in the above listed topic areas in order to meet the first requirement to sit for the ten-hour CFP Board Certification Examination. A bachelor's degree (or higher), or its equivalent in any discipline, from an accredited college or university is required to attain certification. The bachelor's degree requirement is a condition of initial certification; it is not a requirement to be eligible to take the CFP Board Certification Examination .

Individuals holding professional designations pre-approved by the CFP Board (such as PhDs in business and economics, attorneys, Certified Public Accountants (CPA), Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA), Chartered Accountants (CA), Chartered Wealth Managers (AAFM), Chartered Life Underwriters (CLU), Chartered Financial Consultants (ChFC), and Chartered Financial Analysts (CFA)) are entitled to register for and take the exam without having to complete the education requirements by using the CFP-board's "challenge" status. Notably, individuals who seek to challenge the CFP certification exam after March 2012 will be required to take a financial planning Capstone course before sitting for the exam.

International degrees may be substituted for a U.S. degree if they receive equivalency from a third-party organization. The CFP Board began requiring a college education in 2008. In the early years for the first 25,000 CFP members, candidates could take the 5 courses and achieve certification without a comprehensive exam. In 1991 a comprehensive exam became required for new students.