Question 1

I don’t feel stressed about money. Why do I need a financial planner?

Accepted Answer

I love this question. Quite simply, if you don’t care about maximizing your dollar, you don’t. We believe
that the great game of life is to see what all we can do with what all we’ve been given, to maximize our
impact in this world. We DO care about maximizing your dollar, and if you don’t, that’s okay but you are
not probably going to find value in what we do. If your goal is to elevate your impact while maintaining
balance, you have found what you’re looking for.

Question 2

We don’t have kids, and the dogs don’t need a million dollars. Why should we save?

Accepted Answer

The fact is you don’t know when you’re going to die. Everyone says they don’t want to end up in a
position of needing help to get around in old age. “Just shoot me,” they say, or “I’ll just take a long walk
in the woods and never come back.” That’s not an honest reply. No one does that. What you save
creates what you earn when you stop working, and if you’re alive in 2030, the likelihood of you living to
100 or beyond goes up by a factor of 5. That means life and living is getting more expensive. You can’t
just end life with your last nickel. It’s impossible. But you can make a meaningful impact to people and
places you have come to love with whatever you have left at the end.

Question 3

All of my benefits are at work. How can a financial planner help me?

Accepted Answer

Benefits at work are probably the single most misunderstood assets in the professional world. And even
if you don’t have an employee stock purchase plan or restricted stock units (RSU’s) or some kind of
executive incentive pay, understanding what you do and – more importantly – do not have is very
difficult. Almost every time, clients discover that there are holes, many of which can be managed for
minimal expense. Especially if you are in a household where you are married making over $200,000 or
single making over $100,000, there are all kinds of things to consider.

Question 4

I’ve been making good money for a while, but I spend too much of what I make and taxes are killing
me. How can you help?

Accepted Answer

Almost to a person, when someone starts making money, they initially need to spend a little either to
catch up or to simply feel the freedom of spreading their financial wings a bit. But once that passes,
there’s a sense of “I really should be doing something better with this than just spending it all.” The art
is a balance between lifestyle and spending. There is no value in only saving up for long term goals.
There’s life to live! But there is most certainly optimal ways to spend and save to reduce your overall
expense to the government, both immediately and long term. Our analyses clarify this path, even if
your compensation changes dramatically from year to year.

Question 5

Can a financial planner help me manage my 401k?

Accepted Answer

Yes. This is one of the great values we bring to clients, helping them not only manage the retirement
plans they have at old jobs, but also managing the ones they have at current jobs. All your retirement
accounts should be thought of as being in suitcases; you can pick them up and take them wherever you
want. They are yours, and there are expensive and inexpensive ways to manage them. So don’t just go
and consolidate your accounts. Talk to us first. There are some very easy ways to save significant
expense, and many similarly easy ways to create additional growth (often without increased risk).

Question 6

What can you do for me that I can’t do for myself?

Accepted Answer

Most people carry around “the weight of the undone,” or the guilt of not having gotten to it yet, or
whatever you want to call it. It’s really not so much a question of “can you do it.” If you want to put in a
lot of time and effort and make financial planning and management your main thing, you can probably
do it. But most people don’t want to do that. Hire what you either don’t have time to do, or what
you’re not great at, or both! We create affordable options for people at any stage of the game to get
started, to organize their accounts, to create confidence in their strategy, and to design a cohesive plan.

Question 7

What is a fiduciary and why is it important?

Accepted Answer

A fiduciary is a person who has a professional obligation to put the interests of their clients before
themselves. We are CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNERS™ or CFP®’s, and, by definition, act as your
fiduciary. It is crucial that when you hire a planner to help you with your financial life, he or she be a
fiduciary. It’s really the only way to know whether they are actually doing this or not.

Question 8

**What is the difference between a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER® and an advisor?

Accepted Answer

Advisors try to create investment returns to help people have enough to stop working at some point.
Planners do the same thing, only they take into account all the variables that can potentially impact that
effort. You may have heard the saying “it’s not what you make; it’s what you keep.” A planner helps
with cash flow, risk management through all types of insurance, investment management, tax planning
strategies, retirement income and planning strategies, and estate planning. As you can see, an advisor
generally helps with only one, maybe two, of those areas. A planner – a CFP® – helps far more
comprehensively, dealing with not just returns, but all the areas that together determine successful
financial outcomes.

Question 9

What are the six areas of planning that a financial planner helps people optimize?

Accepted Answer

In priority order from basic to advanced, cash flow management, risk management (insurance
coverages, etc.), investment planning, tax planning strategies, retirement planning strategies, and estate
planning. I would add that a good planner also consults on the effective use of debt (kind of a combo of
cash flow management and risk management), how and when a guaranteed income may be an
appropriate solution (kind of a combo of risk management and retirement planning), Business transition
strategy (how to sell, transfer, and structure a business transition deal), and being strategic about other
types of investments including real estate and small business venture capital investments.

Question 10

Should I hire one person as an accountant, an attorney, and financial planner? Or should each be
separate?

Accepted Answer

Separate. Some companies are big enough to have a tax division and an investment division. There are
also some professionals who claim to be able to do everything. Generally, in almost every situation, you
should have three people, one for each role. For example, as a financial planner, I am not an accountant
and I am not an attorney, and everything I say about those two fields is not final and should be checked
against an expert in that field. That said, I often consult together with accountants and attorneys (and
often insist on it) and am very familiar with what they do, what it costs, and what structure may be best
in a given situation.

For The Affluent & Tax Focused

Unlock Your Financial Potential: Solutions for Affluent and Tax-Focused