FAQ

 

1.  How much do you charge?

Retainer (flat annual fee)
Retainer fees varies based on the client’s situation.  Retainer fee quotes for the first year can be provided after a brief no-cost, no-pressure initial consultation, either over the phone or in-person.  If you hire us on an annual retainer basis (which includes financial planning AND investment management), the annual retainer fee is subjectively determined based on your income, assets, perceived complexity, and other subjective measures.  

While we don’t determine or set retainer fees based solely on investment assets or net worth, to give you a sense of what our current retainer clients (a very diverse set of individuals and families) are currently paying in annual retainer fees, as of July, 2024:

  • (1) As an approximate percentage of investment assets being advised on
    • Average: less than 0.50% per year 
    • Range: 0.20% to 0.75% per year 
  • (2) As an approximate percentage of net worth
    • Average: less than 0.25% per year 
    • Range: 0.12% to 0.47% per year 

Your retainer fee, as a new or prospective client, may be higher or lower than above (and these ranges and averages may fluctuate over time).  You can find out specifically what your retainer fee would be by contacting us and scheduling a brief no-cost, no-pressure initial consultation, either over the phone or in-person.

Hourly
Hourly advice is only offered in limited situations and the hourly rate varies based on the client’s situation.  The hourly rate is subjectively determined based on perceived complexity and other subjective measures.  Hourly fee quotes and estimate of hours required can be provided after a brief initial consultation, either over the phone or in-person.

See our Form ADV or Client Relationship Summary for more details.

2.  Will I pay a separate fee for financial planning and investment management?

No.  Financial planning AND investment management services are included as part of the subjectively determined annual retainer fee.  If you are only interested in financial planning services and not investment advice/management, we can likely accommodate that need via an Hourly arrangement.

See our Form ADV or Client Relationship Summary for more details. 

3.  Why don’t you charge an AUM (Assets Under Management) fee for investment management services?

We feel the retainer fee model (aka fixed fee, aka fee-for-service) results in fewer inherent conflicts of interest between the advisor and the client and will ultimately result in a better advisor-client relationship and a better long-term outcome for the client.  

While we don’t determine or set retainer fees based strictly on investment assets under management/advisement (like many fee-only firms do), the retainer fee is subjectively determined based on the client’s income, assets, perceived complexity, and other subjective measures.  So the amount of your investment assets is a factor, among many other factors, in setting the retainer fee.

4.  How often will you review my investment portfolio?

If you become a retainer client, scheduled portfolio reviews and financial plan updates typically occur every six months.  Additional non-scheduled reviews may take place upon your request or as needed, due to a change in your financial situation or other changing conditions.  Fore retainer clients, we are available throughout the year to help answer any questions or deal with any planning issues that might arise outside of the scheduled review periods.

For hourly clients, we do not have scheduled reviews.  Hourly clients must contact us and request to engage us each time they need our help with a planning issue.  

See our Form ADV or Client Relationship Summary for more details.

5. Will you make changes to my investment portfolio without my approval?

No.  We manage client investment portfolios on a non-discretionary basis, which means we will review investment strategies and specific recommendations with you and obtain your approval prior to placing trades and allocating the investments within your accounts (accounts over which you have granted us such authority).  In addition, for accounts which you have not granted us trading authority (“outside accounts”), such as workplace retirement plans (401ks, 403bs, etc), you are responsible for implementing the recommended / agreed-upon changes.  If you need help with this, we can schedule a call and do a screen share and we can help you navigate the website and help you figure out how to make the changes.

See our Form ADV or Client Relationship Summary for more details.

6. Will you advise me on when is the best time to get in and out of the stock market?  

No.  We are not able to accurately and precisely predict the near term future.  That’s not something we believe is possible for us or anyone else to do reliably and repeatedly.  If that’s a service you are looking for, you will have to look for an advisor that attempts to time the market.

While we don’t engage in market timing, we may recommend making portfolio adjustments in light of changing market conditions and/or as a result of large market movements.  The primary purpose of such rebalancing adjustments is to maintain portfolio diversification and/or desired risk levels, not because we are making short-term predictions about the future movement of markets.

Our investment philosophy:

  • We believe that every investment has risk and offers potential rewards.
  • We believe it is important to help clients evaluate their goals and risk tolerance, and to develop an investment strategy that addresses both.
  • We believe that fixed income investments play an important role in reducing risk, and that including a global mix of stocks in a variety of sizes and styles provides the best combination of investment risk and investment return.
  • We believe that attempts to time the market or make predictions about individual stocks or market segments will not be beneficial over the long run.
  • We believe that setting a target portfolio allocation and periodically re-allocating to control risk and improve tax and cost efficiencies is an excellent strategy.
  • We believe that it is important to regularly review portfolio allocations in light of a client’s changing goals and situation.
  • We believe that modifying the target allocation is appropriate when the client’s goals or situation changes.
  • We believe that using low-cost funds and minimizing transaction costs is critical to maximizing long-term investments returns.

7. Will you make individual stock recommendations?

No, we do not generally recommend the purchase of individual stocks.  However, a client may hold individual stocks in their accounts and/or ask us to purchase individual stocks or other types of securities in their accounts.  We may provide advice on the sale of individual securities, taking into account income tax implications, size of the position, need for diversification, liquidity of the security, and publicly available information about the security, among other things.

We primarily use low-cost mutual funds and exchange traded funds to construct globally diversified client portfolios, including many funds from Dimensional and select funds from Vanguard, BlackRock (iShares), and WisdomTree, among others.

See our Form ADV or Client Relationship Summary for more details.

8. Can you prepare my income tax returns?

Yes, potentially.  We typically offer new or existing retainer clients Income Tax Preparation Services (for a separate fee).  If your income tax returns are deemed to be more complex than we feel comfortable with, we will not offer this service to you.

We do not typically offer Income Tax Preparation Services to hourly clients or to non-clients.