Core Service
Financial planning is planning out your life, and how money gets you there.
Most people hear "financial advisor" and think of someone managing investments. Some think of someone who gives financial advice as questions come up. Both are real jobs, and neither one is financial planning.
In short
Financial planning is the act of planning out your life, and planning out how money helps you get what you actually want, as efficiently as possible. The investments are part of it. So are the taxes, the estate documents, the insurance, and the cash flow that runs underneath all of them. Planning is the discipline that looks at all of those at once and asks whether they line up with the life you're trying to live, and with what's actually possible.
It isn't a one-time event, because some things have to be planned on an ongoing basis. But at its heart it's a periodic assessment: here is the life you want, here is what you have, here is how the investments, taxes, estate, insurance, and cash flow are currently arranged, and here is how far apart those things are. Then it closes the gap.
Why the pieces have to be planned together
Almost every financial decision touches the others. An investment decision has tax consequences. A tax strategy changes your cash flow. An estate question changes how the investments should be built and which account should hold what. An insurance question sits on top of all of it. Plan any one of them alone and you get an answer that's right for that piece and wrong for the whole.
That's why the plan is built at one table, with the investments, the taxes, and the life you want all in the room. It's also why the plan comes first and the portfolio is built to serve it. Investment management here means managing your assets in accordance with your plan, and there is no plan to manage in accordance with until this work is done.
Here, the planning process is The Keystone Method
Most financial planning ends the same way: you're handed a list. Things to go do, accounts to open, forms to find, an attorney to call. The plan is the document, and the work is yours.
The Keystone Method is our financial planning process, and it has a name because it's built to get the work done. Over about six months, the decisions are made with you, at the table, and then they're done with you and for you wherever it's at all possible to do. Our team runs the analysis and the modeling between meetings, coordinates with your CPA and attorney, and moves the paperwork. What's genuinely yours to do comes to you prioritized, one thing at a time, with the reason attached.
You walk away with three things. The decisions, each one settled on purpose while the engagement is running. The actions, in motion, with what's ours handled by us. And a picture of your whole financial life that's accurate, current, and understood by both of us.
Keystone is a flat fee, $6,000 for Keystone Personal and $12,000 for Keystone Owner, refundable in full at any point during the engagement, for any reason. The pricing page has every number.
What the plan covers
Cash flow, and what your life actually costs. Retirement income, and how savings become a paycheck. Taxes, planned across your lifetime rather than one year at a time. Investments, built to the plan. Estate documents, so what you've decided is written down and will hold. Insurance, reviewed against the plan. And, for owners, the business and the personal picture as one thing.
What continues once the plan exists
By the end of six months we've wrapped our minds around your whole picture together, and that understanding is what makes the next chapter possible. There are two ways the work continues. Both are optional, both are on the table from the first meeting, and many families choose both.
Wealth Advisory is the ongoing relationship, and it's three things: someone to ask about anything involving money who understands your whole picture, someone managing your investments as a fiduciary in accordance with the plan, and someone proactively thinking about your situation and bringing you what you should know, twice a year, with the tasks that actually matter.
Tax Advisory is the management of your entire tax life for one monthly fee: the year managed on purpose, the return as the result, and an Enrolled Agent to hand any IRS letter to.
Some engagements end at Keystone, happily. People take the system home and come back when life changes.
Before you decide
Questions people ask.
Bring the rest to the Explore Call.
Is financial planning the same as having a financial advisor?
No. An advisor may manage your investments or answer questions as they come up. Financial planning is the assessment of your whole financial life against the life you want, across investments, taxes, estate, insurance, and cash flow, and the work of closing the gap. Here, that process is The Keystone Method.
Do I have to move my investments to do the planning?
No. Whether they move is decided during the work, based on what the plan needs.
What if I only need one thing figured out?
That one thing almost always touches three others, which is why the planning is done whole. The Explore Call is the place to say what's on your mind and hear whether this is the right fit for it.
Is it a one-time thing?
The plan is built once, in about six months. Keeping it true as life changes is what Wealth Advisory and Tax Advisory are for, and both are optional.
Tax advisory, tax planning implementation, and tax preparation are provided through Talley Tax, a separate business owned and operated by David Talley. Tax advice is given by Talley Tax. Talley Wealth and Talley Tax work in concert, and they are separate entities. Securities and advisory services are offered through Cambridge entities as described in the site footer; Talley Tax is not affiliated with Cambridge. Talley Wealth advisory services do not include tax preparation unless a separate Talley Tax relationship is established. About Tax Advisory.
The next conversation
Where to start
The first step is an Explore Call. Fifteen minutes, by phone, with the question that's on your mind and nothing else. If it makes sense to keep going, the next conversation is a Strategy Session, and that's where the planning begins.