Post-Divorce Transition Assistance

Welcome to this new chapter in your life! With our divorce financial services, you have the opportunity to start over again; to find new meaning and purpose. We can help you lay the financial foundation for your new life. Whether you need help with simply planning a budget or making sure your investments are set up to meet your life goals, we can help you find financial clarity.

Read more about we help people going through this major life transition.

Our post-divorce services include:

Helping Safeguard Your Settlement

Your divorce settlement should be designed to help support your lifestyle for the long term. We work with you to help you stick to your financial plan.

Investment Issues

Investments that may have been in a joint portfolio or an ex’s 401k or IRA may need to be reallocated once these holding are split. You may have different investment risk tolerances than your spouse and different goals. We help you align your investments with your unique circumstances.

Hands-On Support

Once the divorce is final there is still work to do to ensure you receive what has been agreed upon in the divorce settlement. We can help you open new accounts, follow up on QDROs, change beneficiary designations and transfer existing accounts. We can also review your different types of insurance, paying attention to obligations under the settlement agreement.

Investment Management

Our investment portfolios are carefully designed to help retirement investors reduce risk, improve returns, and create a reliable income stream.

There are three key principles we follow to help protect your nest egg:

1.) KEEP COSTS LOW

The best predictor of future returns is the cost of your investments. In other words, low-cost investments are expected to provide better returns than high-cost investments.

For that reason, we build our retirement portfolios using ultra-low-cost index funds. This helps to improve the success rate of your retirement plan and reduce unnecessary risk.

2.) OWN TAX-EFFICIENT INVESTMENTS

Warren Buffet says his favorite holding period is forever. We agree.

While buying an investment and holding it forever isn't practical for most retirees, we create portfolios with "low turnover."

Every time an investment is bought or sold (i.e "turned over"), costs are incurred. Not just obvious costs like transaction fees and taxes, but hidden costs like bid-ask spreads.

These costs eat away at your investment returns. To protect your investment returns and mitigate taxes, we target investments with low turnover.

3.) OWN THE RIGHT ASSET CLASSES

We only invest in asset classes that:

  1. Have been proven through academic research to provide superior risk-adjusted returns
  2. Work well when invested together in a diversified portfolio (e.g. low and/or negative correlation to each other)

For example, corporate bonds can behave like stocks during catastrophic events. That does not provide the diversification needed by a retirement investor.

As a fiduciary, our job is to make investment decisions that are in your best interest. This means ignoring the daily headlines and sticking with evidence-based solutions.

Want to learn more about creating income in retirement? CLICK START HERE.

Social Security Timing

As retirement planning specialists, we help you determine the best time to collect Social Security.

To do that, we take into consideration how your Social Security benefits will interact with other income

sources such as:

  • Rental income
  • Pensions
  • Required Minimum Distributions (RMDs)
  • Dividends and interest
  • Capital gains

We also factor in family health conditions, spousal benefits, personal preferences, and more.

By analyzing your entire financial picture, we are able to choose a Social Security timing strategy that reduces your tax bill in retirement and optimizes your income stream.

Want to learn more about choosing the right Social Security claiming strategy? CLICK START HERE.

Retirement Income

We help turn your nest egg into a reliable income stream.

Our approach is backed by decades of academic research and helps:

  • Keep your taxes low
  • Reduce costs
  • Maximize your investment return
  • Lower portfolio risk
  • Preserve your savings

Our approach also takes into consideration your other income sources. Things like Social Security, Pensions, Rental Income, Required Minimum Distributions, and more.

We carefully coordinate all of your income streams to help make sure you don't pay more than your fair share of taxes.

Why?

Because it's very possible to be in a higher tax bracket in retirement than as a working professional.

Keeping taxes low throughout retirement is one of the key ingredients to a successful plan.

Want to learn more about creating income in retirement? CLICK START HERE.

Tax Planning

Without careful planning, it's very possible to have a higher tax bill in retirement than as a working professional.

Our tax planning services aim to help keep taxes low today and in retirement. We accomplish this through:

  • Annual Tax Return Analysis
  • Annual Roth Conversions
  • Coordination & Timing of Income Streams (e.g. Pension, Social Security, Required Minimum Distributions, etc.)
  • Asset Location
  • Charitable Giving Strategies

We also stay up-to-date with the ever-changing tax laws to ensure you are taking advantage of every opportunity.

Want to learn more about lowering your tax bill in retirement? CLICK START HERE.

Insurance review

Our insurance planning helps you maximize your protection and lower your annual costs.

After we perform a comprehensive insurance analysis, we help you shop the entire market to find the best policy at the best price. We also help you safely unwind insurance policies that were wrongfully sold to you.

We conduct regular in-depth reviews for our clients on the following types of insurance:

  • Life Insurance
  • Long Term Care Insurance
  • Auto & Home Insurance
  • Disability Insurance
  • Umbrella Insurance
  • Health Insurance

Want to learn more about lowering your tax bill in retirement? CLICK START HERE.