Discovery Conversation
Every relationship begins with a complimentary 20–30 minute discovery conversation.
This is an opportunity for us to learn a little about you, what you’re looking for, and how we may be able to help. It’s also an opportunity for you to learn about us.
The goal is simple: determine whether we’re a good fit for each other and, if so, which of our services makes the most sense for you.
Start A ConversationFour Ways We Can Help
Some people want an ongoing relationship with an advisor who understands their entire financial life. Others need a comprehensive financial plan, help with a specific decision, or simply the opportunity to ask an experienced advisor a few questions.
1. Wealth Management
An ongoing advisory relationship for people who want help managing their financial life.
2. One-Time Planning
A comprehensive financial plan without an ongoing wealth-management relationship.
3. Hourly Advice
Sometimes you don’t need a financial plan. You just need good advice on a specific decision.
4. Live Workshops
Learn about important financial topics in a live, small-group online setting.
Wealth Management
An ongoing advisory relationship for people who want help managing their financial life.
Wealth Management is our most comprehensive service. Rather than providing advice at a single point in time, we become your ongoing financial advisor and help you navigate financial decisions as your life evolves.
Our work may include:
One of the most important things we do is help answer a deceptively simple question:
“Do I have enough to live the life I want?”
We help you identify what you want your money to accomplish, evaluate your resources, model different possibilities and understand the tradeoffs involved. The objective isn’t simply to accumulate more money. It’s to help you make informed decisions with a clearer understanding of what your financial resources can reasonably support.
And because life changes, this isn’t a one-time exercise. We continue walking alongside you—before retirement, throughout retirement and, when appropriate, into planning for the next generation.
Requirements & Fees
Wealth Management carries a minimum annual fee of $5,000. This minimum is automatically met for clients with at least $500,000 in assets under our direct management.
Your total fee is the sum of these amounts. Each lower rate applies only to the investments within that tier—not to your entire portfolio.
One-Time Financial Planning
A comprehensive financial plan without an ongoing wealth-management relationship.
You may want comprehensive financial advice even if you don’t need—or don’t yet qualify for—ongoing Wealth Management.
Our One-Time Financial Planning service is a defined engagement designed to help you understand where you stand, what your financial future may look like, and what adjustments could improve your likelihood of accomplishing the things that matter to you.
Unlike Wealth Management, this engagement has a defined beginning and end.
What You Receive
We build a comprehensive financial plan incorporating your financial resources, savings, investments, income, expected retirement benefits and other relevant information along with the goals you’ve identified for your future.
We’ll model assumptions such as investment returns, inflation, retirement timing, spending and longevity and evaluate how those assumptions affect your plan.
Rather than simply handing you a report, we’ll work through different scenarios with you. If your initial plan indicates that your goals may be difficult to accomplish, we’ll identify the factors driving the result and explore alternatives—such as changing retirement timing, savings, spending or other assumptions.
The fee covers the planning process described above. More complex situations requiring substantially additional analysis may require a higher fee; if so, we’ll discuss and agree upon the fee with you before beginning the engagement.
The Process
Discovery Conversation
We begin by learning what you’re trying to accomplish and determining whether this service is a good fit.
Online Fact Finder
We’ll send you a secure questionnaire to gather information about your income, savings, investments, retirement benefits, financial resources and goals.
Planning Meeting
We’ll meet in our office or by video conference to review your information, clarify your goals and make sure we understand the financial decisions and questions that matter most to you.
Plan Development
We’ll analyze your information, build your financial plan and evaluate different scenarios. Typically, we’ll schedule your plan presentation approximately one to two weeks after the planning meeting.
Plan Presentation
We’ll walk through your plan together, explain the results, test alternatives and make adjustments where appropriate. Our goal is for you to leave understanding both where you stand and the decisions available to you.
Follow-Up
Approximately three weeks later, we’ll reconnect by phone or video conference to answer questions that have come up after you’ve had time to review and think about the plan.
That completes the One-Time Financial Planning engagement.
Keeping Your Plan Current
You’ll retain online access to your financial plan for 12 months.
If you’d like us to update and revisit the plan in a future year, we offer an annual planning update for $1,000, which generally includes updating your information and assumptions, preparing the revised analysis, and a meeting to review the updated plan. Online access will then continue for another 12 months.
One-Time Financial Planning does not establish an ongoing Wealth Management relationship. After the engagement is complete, we’re always happy to answer an occasional brief question, but additional meetings or advisory work can be scheduled separately at our hourly rate.
Hourly Financial Advice
Sometimes you don’t need a financial plan. You just need good advice.
Maybe you’re early in your career. Maybe you have a decision to make about your 401(k), retirement, an investment, a pension, Social Security or another financial issue. Or perhaps you’d simply like an experienced financial advisor to look at your situation and give you an independent perspective.
You can meet with us for a focused one-hour consultation, either in our office or by video conference.
Bring your questions. Bring your statements. Bring the decision you’re struggling with.
We’ll spend the hour on whatever financial issues are most important to you.
A complimentary discovery conversation comes first so we can make sure your questions are appropriate for an hourly consultation and that we’re a good fit for each other.
Live Financial Workshops (Coming Soon)
Learn about important financial topics in a small-group setting.
Each month, we’ll host a live online session focused on a specific financial topic.
Topics may include retirement planning, Social Security, investing, taxes in retirement, market volatility, estate planning, retirement income and other financial decisions.
These aren’t large, anonymous webinars. Each live session is limited to 10 participants, giving you the opportunity to ask questions and participate in the discussion.
Browse our upcoming calendar and choose the sessions that interest you.
The Annual Workshop Pass gives you access to our live financial workshops for 12 months from the date you enroll, subject to availability for each session.
Not Sure Which Option Is Right for You?
That’s exactly what the discovery conversation is for. You don’t need to decide which service you need before contacting us. Tell us what you’re trying to accomplish, and we’ll help you understand the different ways we can work together.
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