Our Client Process
We don't drop a financial plan on you and disappear. Our five-phase process is designed to be thorough, human, and ongoing — because your financial life isn't static, and neither are we.
Phase 01
Before we can build anything, we need to understand who you are — your goals, your fears, your financial story so far.
Most financial planning starts with spreadsheets. Ours starts with a conversation. We take time to understand not just your numbers, but what they mean to you — what you're building toward, what keeps you up at night, and what success actually looks like for your family.
A no-pressure conversation to determine if we're a mutual fit. We ask the questions advisors rarely ask — about your values, your vision, and what's worked or hasn't worked for you in the past.
We collect a comprehensive financial snapshot: income, expenses, assets, liabilities, insurance coverage, estate documents, tax returns, employee benefits, and equity compensation details.
We work through a structured goals conversation — short, medium, and long-term — including retirement, education funding, major purchases, lifestyle goals, and legacy intentions.
We assess your true risk tolerance — not just what you say, but how you've actually behaved in volatile markets. We also assess your risk capacity based on time horizon and cash flow needs.
Phase 1 Deliverables
Phase 02
We do the work most advisors skip — digging into your tax picture, cash flow, equity compensation, and protection gaps.
This is where we separate from a typical advisory relationship. We don't just look at your investment accounts — we look at your entire financial picture, with particular emphasis on the tax implications of every decision you're making today and every decision we might recommend.
We review your last 2–3 years of tax returns to understand your effective rate, marginal bracket, sources of income, capital gains exposure, and any carryforward losses. This becomes the foundation for everything we recommend.
We build a clear picture of money in and money out — including irregular income, RSU vesting schedules, bonuses, and large upcoming expenditures. Understanding your actual cash flow is essential to building a realistic plan.
For clients with RSUs, stock options, or ESPP, we analyze vesting schedules, concentration risk, tax treatment at vesting and sale, and 83(b) election opportunities where applicable.
We review existing life, disability, liability, and property coverage against your actual needs. Most high-income households are underinsured in ways that aren't obvious until something goes wrong.
We review beneficiary designations across all accounts, existing wills and trusts, titling of assets, and power of attorney documents — identifying gaps and misalignments with your stated intentions.
We analyze your current holdings for overlap, concentration, hidden fees, factor exposures, and tax inefficiency. This gives us a clear baseline before we make any changes.
Phase 2 Deliverables
Phase 03
We build a coordinated strategy that treats every financial decision as interconnected — because they are.
Strategy is where the hard thinking happens. We take everything from Phase 2 and build a coordinated, written plan — not a generic template, but a document built specifically for your household, your income, your goals, and your tax situation.
We build a comprehensive written financial plan covering investment strategy, tax strategy, savings targets, insurance recommendations, estate planning priorities, and projected scenarios for retirement and major life events.
We draft a written Investment Policy Statement (IPS) — a formal document outlining your investment objectives, risk parameters, asset allocation targets, rebalancing methodology, and tax management approach.
We design a specific tax strategy for your situation — including Roth conversion windows, backdoor and mega backdoor Roth opportunities, tax-loss harvesting strategy, asset location across account types, and bracket management.
We design a target portfolio with a value tilt and diversified factor exposure — using institutional-quality funds from Dimensional, Vanguard, BlackRock, and others — built to deliver after-tax returns, not just pre-tax.
We present your complete financial plan in a dedicated meeting, walking through every recommendation, the reasoning behind it, and the tradeoffs involved. We answer every question before anything is implemented.
After the presentation, we refine the plan based on your feedback and priorities. The final plan is yours to keep — a living document that will be updated as your life changes.
Phase 3 Deliverables
Phase 04
We execute the plan thoughtfully — considering tax consequences at every step and moving at the right pace for your situation.
Implementation is not just clicking buttons. Done well, it's a deliberate, sequenced process designed to minimize unnecessary tax events, manage transition costs, and set your portfolio up correctly from the start. We don't rush it.
We coordinate the transfer of existing accounts to Altruist, set up new accounts where needed (Roth IRA, taxable brokerage, etc.), and ensure all accounts are properly titled and beneficiary designations are updated.
For taxable accounts, we map out a transition strategy that harvests any existing losses before selling appreciated positions, spreads gains across tax years where possible, and identifies positions worth holding for long-term status.
We construct your portfolio according to the approved Investment Policy Statement — placing the right assets in the right account types (asset location), establishing your target allocation, and implementing your factor tilts.
We set up automatic contributions, establish savings targets as recurring transfers, configure dividend reinvestment preferences, and create the workflow for handling RSU vesting events and bonuses going forward.
Where needed, we coordinate directly with your CPA and estate attorney — providing them with the relevant pieces of your plan and working alongside them to ensure our strategies are implemented correctly at the tax and legal level.
Once implementation is complete, we meet to confirm everything is in place, review any open items, and walk through how to read your new account statements and monitor your portfolio through the client portal.
Phase 4 Deliverables
Phase 05
The relationship doesn't end at implementation. It's just beginning. We stay proactive, present, and accountable to your plan year after year.
The real work of a financial advisor happens after the plan is built — in the moments when markets fall, tax laws change, life throws a curveball, or a great opportunity appears. We stay close so you never have to navigate those moments alone.
Every quarter we connect to review your portfolio performance, confirm your allocation is on target, address any questions, and discuss anything coming up in the next 90 days that may require action — RSU vesting, bonuses, major expenses, or life changes.
Each year we conduct a comprehensive review — updating your financial plan, reviewing your tax situation with an eye toward the upcoming filing, revisiting your goals, and making any strategic adjustments to your investment policy or savings targets.
We actively monitor your taxable portfolio for harvesting opportunities throughout the year — not just in December. Every harvest creates a tax asset that can offset future gains or reduce your ordinary income by up to $3,000 per year.
We rebalance your portfolio on a rules-based schedule — using new contributions and dividend income first to avoid unnecessary tax events, and selling only when drift exceeds defined thresholds. Rebalancing is done with tax consequences front of mind.
Job change, new child, divorce, inheritance, home purchase, business sale — life doesn't follow a schedule and neither do we. When something significant happens, we're available to help you think through the financial implications before you act.
Every November and December we run a year-end tax review — evaluating Roth conversion opportunities, confirming estimated tax payments, reviewing charitable giving strategy, and taking any final loss harvesting actions before the year closes.
Ongoing Deliverables
Ready to Begin
If this level of thoroughness is what you've been looking for, we'd love to start the conversation.
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