Financial Planning

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Whether it’s owning your own home, funding your children’s education, or creating a stress-free retirement, a financial plan is considered vital in working towards your goals. A well-grounded and effective plan goes beyond the realm of saving, budgeting, and investing. It also considers other elements of your financial picture, including insurance planning, tax planning, retirement planning, estate planning, and much more.

By understanding the role of financial planning in meeting your short, intermediate, and long-term financial aspirations, you'll be better equipped to control your financial future.

Our Approach to Financial Planning

  • Discovering You: Our process begins with a consultative discovery meeting designed to learn more about you and your goals. This is also an opportunity for you to learn more about what we do, and see if we’re a good fit for your needs.
  • Strategy Planning: Once we learn who you are, we'll start developing your personalized plan. Through our strategy-building process, we’ll create a set of personalized plans – for the short, intermediate, and long-term – that aim to fulfill your overall financial strategy. We use a consultative and iterative approach, so each session brings us closer to the financial objectives we set together.
  • Implementation: Whether it’s making the right investment decisions, choosing the right insurance plan for you and your family, saving to reach your retirement goals, or creating an estate plan that preserves your legacy; our financial professionals will be right there by your side as you take each step. Through foresight, encouragement, and professionalism, we’ll make sure each step of your plan is implemented.
  • Review and Support: We’ll laud you at every successful implementation of your financial plan, and help you stay on track to meet your objectives. Through plan reviews, we’ll consult with you and make modifications to your strategies and plans as needed.
 

Retirement Planning

happy-old-couple

Everything you do – from planning the education and designations you'd like to acquire, to starting a career& and managing your career progression – is done in the hopes that you and your loved ones can have a better life. But in all your planning, have you remembered to plan for life after work?

If you fail to plan for life after work, all the effort you’ve put into your working life may be jeopardized, and you may be left with more questions than answers. And an ill-prepared retirement is bound to be one filled with financial stress and chaos, instead of life-enriching experiences and freedom.

How We Can Help

Retirement planning shouldn’t start at retirement; it should start well before. We take a long-term view of your financial wellbeing to help create a life after work that is as well-planned as your life while working.

  • Understand your goals: Through an intensely personalized approach, we discover what your retirement goals are. Whether it’s travel, a new hobby, or spending more time with the people you love, we’ll help you strive for your ideal retirement.
  • Analyze your current position: To plan a meaningful retirement, you need to know where you currently stand. We’ll help you build an in-depth financial inventory to use as part of our retirement planning process.
  • Develop your plan: We’ll work with you to create a retirement plan that aims to address them. When we’re done, you’ll not only have a better understanding of your investments, and what you need to fund your retirement lifestyle, you’ll also be better equipped to handle any shortfalls.
  • Implement your plan: As you move closer to retirement, we’ll work with you to ensure the plans are implemented in a phased and orderly manner. The goal of our retirement planning approach is to make your transition to retirement as seamless and stress-free as possible.
  • Support you in pension and benefit decisions: We’ll be here if you need advice on Government or Employer pension and benefits: when to apply, how to apply, what to do with your funds, and much more.
  • Partner with you in retirement and beyond: A long and fulfilling retirement takes multiple facets of your financial picture into consideration: health care, long-term care, insurance, legacy planning, and charitable giving. Our financial professionals will be here for you when you need advice in any of these areas.
  • Provide ongoing reviews: We’ll continue to review your retirement plans, and consult with you about any changes or updates needed to address your evolving retirement lifestyle needs.
 

Investment Planning

Plant growing in Coins glass jar for money saving

It’s been said that you reap what you sow. And when it comes to enjoying your investments, truer words have never been spoken. Even if you don’t have thousands of dollars to invest, simply taking the time to choose where to park your money can be rewarding.

Through developing a personalized investment strategy, diversification, and avoiding short-term distractions, we aim to help create and preserve your wealth so you reach your financial goals.

Our Investment Planning Process

  • Create a point-in-time snapshot: We analyze where you are in terms of your current portfolio. In some cases, we can provide immediately actionable steps that benefit you; like leveraging tax-selling or profit-harvesting opportunities.
  • Develop an investment strategy: From your snapshot, we’ll draw-up personalized investment strategies that will help you pursue your financial objectives. This may be accomplished by building upon your existing portfolio or proposing a set of tax-efficient investments that are aligned with your personal financial goals.
  • Implement your plan: Our dynamic approach to investment planning evolves with your changing circumstances. We’ll guide and advise you on investment plan transitions as you go through life and lifestyle changes.
  • Consult, and counsel: Ours is an ongoing partnership. Throughout our relationship with you, we’ll review your investments, keep you informed, and communicate constantly with you about proposed changes and potential risks or opportunities for your investments.

Book a meeting with one of our professionals to learn more about our investment planning strategies.

Let's Get Started

There is no guarantee that a diversified portfolio will enhance overall returns or outperform a non-diversified portfolio. Diversification does not protect against market risk.

 

Estate Planning

concept of mortgage and housing for families. mother father and child from roof of house on nature

If you wish to leave behind a meaningful legacy, be it for loved ones or a charitable institution, you need to put a well-thought-out estate plan in place. Without an established plan, the fate of your estate could be determined by the government, lawyers, or people that don’t have your interests and best wishes in mind.

Having an estate plan is paramount in ensuring your estate is handled according to your wishes. Together with your estate planning attorney, we can assist in drafting documents and reviewing your situation so your estate benefits the people and charities you care about most.

What We Can Do For You

  • Will education: We can help you understand how to structure your will so your legal team can create a document that reflects how you want your estate disposed of and distributed. From a simple will to a testamentary will, or joint wills and living wills – our team will help you navigate the complexities of this document so you won’t need to stress over specifics.
  • Creating Powers of Attorney (POA): Whether it’s to manage specific assets, such as investments, accounts, and real estate holdings, or to help others make health care decisions if you are ill or incapacitated, you need a POA in place to ensure your wishes are followed. A well-crafted POA will also smoothen how decisions about your final arrangements, and those related to your estate, are taken care of once you pass.
  • Choosing executors: The executors of your estate wield strong powers that determine how your estate is handled upon your passing. We’ll help you understand the importance of choosing an executor(s) for your estate, and what criteria you should consider when appointing someone to discharge this all-important role – especially if minor children/guardians are involved.
  • Designating beneficiaries: If you don’t choose beneficiaries for your assets carefully, your estate assets might end up in the hands of individuals that you never intended should benefit from them. A well-thought-out estate plan ensures the needs of your dependents are taken care of.
  • Minimizing estate taxes and probate fees: Taxes, fees, and other levies have the potential to erode a large part of your estate before your beneficiaries see a cent. Careful planning can reduce the impact taxes and fees may have.
  • Estate protection: Even after you pass, many of your assets – such as long-term investments and property – will likely need protection and management until they are disposed of and their proceeds are distributed to your beneficiaries. In the absence of an estate plan, your assets will likely not receive the type and level of protection those assets require.
  • Distribute your legacy: Our professionals can support you in synchronizing your estate plans and your will, so your assets are distributed in line with your final wishes.

Schedule a meeting with us to see what an estate plan can do for you.

Contact Us

Our firm does not provide legal advice or services. Please consult your legal advisor or an estate planning attorney regarding your specific situation.

 

Tax Planning

Taxpayer using a laptop to file taxes personal income

It’s said that only two things are certain in life: Death…and Taxes! And while there’s not much you can do to avoid the former, with prudent planning and foresight, there’s a lot you can do to minimize the latter. However, similar to planning that goes into living a happy and fruitful life, a well-planned tax strategy can yield great benefits – but only if it’s done professionally, and earlier on during your wealth accumulation cycle.

Our Tax Planning philosophy is not centered around tax avoidance, but rather on helping you structure your finances, so you and your family aren’t overburdened by undue tax liability.

Why Tax Planning is Important

Consider this fact: If you managed to shave off just $250 from your tax bill each year, through prudent Tax Planning, and invested it at a 5% rate of return annually, you could have a tidy sum of over $15,250 waiting for you by the time you retire in 30 years!

Delayed tax planning is tantamount to leaving potentially savable dollars, of your hard-earned money, on the tax table for others to benefit from. The longer you defer tax planning, the more money you’ll end up owing and paying in taxes. That money could potentially have been saved, through a reduced tax bill, invested, and grown, through the magic of compounding, over many years.

What We Can Do For You

We help our clients through long-term Tax Planning strategies – and that’s exactly how we’ll help you. Tax planning does not commence on the date of filing your tax returns. Prudent tax planning often starts long before – sometimes even before you make investment decisions that trigger a tax liability. We can help devise tax planning strategies that seek to minimize taxes, maximize tax refunds and guide you to optimize your tax-friendly investment returns.

Here’s what we can do for you through our Tax Planning service:

  • While the best advice you can get is: Save. Save. Save…as much as you can. The next best advice is: Be careful how you invest those savings. Our Tax Planning advice will include considerations on whether you should invest with pre-tax dollars, or post-tax income. How you invest, and in what types of vehicles, can make a significant difference to the taxes you pay. Our Tax specialists can help you navigate through the various advantages and disadvantages of choosing one strategy over another
  • When planning for tax impact on your income, we’ll also plan for the types of income that you might receive: Dividends, Interest, Annuity payments, Capital Gains, Inheritances, Employer or Government benefits. While all of these are potential income streams in retirement and before, each has different tax planning implications
  • Our tax planning specialists will help you foresee impacts to your future net wealth. If left unplanned, your net wealth could be diminished due to likely claw-backs to benefits, and the possibility of erosion to your estate through substantial taxes
  • We’ll help you mitigate possible tax impacts when it comes to your estate. A good tax plan will ensure that future generations do not bear the burden of taxes due to the legacy you leave them. But to ensure a tax-advantage inheritance to your beneficiaries, you need to put appropriate plans in place NOW – and that’s where our Tax Planning specialists can help

This is a hypothetical example and is not representative of any specific situation. Your results will vary. The hypothetical rates of return used do not reflect the deduction of fees and charges inherent to investing.