Analysis & X-Ray

Our professionals will provide a portfolio analysis to help you discover more about the fees you are paying within your 401(k), IRA, variable annuity, or brokerage account. If you’re paying fees, let’s make sure it’s for the right reasons and that you’re getting what you’re paying for.

In most cases, we can lower the fees that you’re currently paying, which means more money for you to spend, grow, and give.

Asset Protection

Which is more important to you: what you make or what you keep?

Many people underestimate the devastation of losses to their portfolio due to market declines and don’t realize how difficult it can be to rebuild an account.

We believe that while accumulation is an important part of retirement planning, protection is more important when it comes to building a foundation for your golden years.

Protecting accumulated assets is a major portion of a solid financial plan. Not losing ground can potentially enhance your comfort level in retirement, and we focus on making you money, not making money back because it was lost. We strictly adhere to Warren Buffet’s rules for investment success: Rule #1: Don’t lose money; Rule #2: See Rule #1.

Participating in market growth is essential to the health of any financial plan, and using the correct financial tools can increase the odds of added success in your favor.

Tax Planning & Preparation

Preparing to file one’s taxes is an important annual procedure, but it is an event that is “past tense.” In other words, it is a recapitulation of an accounting of the events prior to calculate the appropriate amount of tax due. The ritual is important, nonetheless, but it does not help you plan to minimize the amount of tax liability you will pay.

Tax planning is a proactive strategy that takes part throughout the entire fiscal year and focuses on reducing the overall amount of taxes through deductions, credits, losses, contributions, conversions, etc. More importantly, no financial decision should be made without looking through the tax “spyglass,” much like a medical professional uses an X-ray machine to help diagnose a potential issue.

Retirement Income Planning

Do you know the difference between a paycheck and a “playcheck”?

Over five decades of combined experience has taught us that planning for retirement income must include added security insulated from many forces outside the scope of your own control. Therefore, we strive to remove unnecessary variables when building predictable, unique, systematic, lifetime paychecks.

Market volatility, interest rates, geo-political risk, etc., to name a few items, should not affect the frequency and value of the paycheck deposited into your checking account on a monthly basis.

In our experience, the happiest retirees are the ones with reliable and systematic monthly income. We help by identifying which assets should be income-producing and in what products or strategies to place these assets. The successful result of this planning can yield monthly income to meet your needs even when the market is not performing well.

Social Security & Pension

Social Security and pension selections are usually one-time, life-changing choices, which should be made with care and consideration. Many personal aspects must be taken into accord, such as mortality, health, financial assets, income requirements, spousal and beneficiary considerations, as well as many others.

We help navigate your choices and translate the jargon into easy-to-understand options to meet your needs and optimize the plan. The choices are married to your income and tax plan and mesh seamlessly throughout the entire process.

Life Insurance

Life insurance can be used for an array of financial planning events, including survivor needs, income replacement, charitable giving, estate tax planning, business continuation, etc.

The use of life insurance in retirement planning is often overlooked. Life insurance has changed dramatically in recent years. The potential tax benefits can be extremely beneficial when a properly constructed contract may provide tax-free income benefits during your life, along with protection for your heirs in the event of death. The benefits may also include chronic illness benefits that are also tax-advantaged during retirement.