I am in the heart of Silicon Valley – I live in San Jose and my office is close by in Campbell, CA. I work with many of my clients remotely, but I always look for opportunities to sit with them in person.
My office is at 1875 S. Bascom Avenue, Suite 2400, Campbell, CA 95008 (I am in the Pruneyard office and shopping complex). Come by and we can discuss your financial future!
We work with clients who have the full complement of company stock compensation and ownership – Non-Qualified Options (NQOs), Incentive Stock Options (ISOs), Restricted Stock Units (RSUs), Employee Stock Purchase Plan (ESPP) shares, Company Stock Performance Shares, Qualified Small Business Stock (QSBS), and Founder’s and other privately-held equity shares.
Phase I – We use qualitative tools such as risk tolerance and professional/life goals questionnaires, as well as personal conversations and interviews, to get to know our clients well. We strive first to know you as a person and as an investor.
Phase II – Phase I gives us context for using more quantitative tools, such as Monte Carlo simulations and portfolio sensitivity analysis, to help the client understand how individual stock and portfolio volatility can create different financial outcomes, and understand the probability of those outcomes, so that they can make informed decisions.
Phase III – We then craft a plan that addresses Phase I and Phase II, but we also account for 1) the tax implications of various diversification strategies, and 2) any limitations you have for how much and when you can sell your company stock (trading windows and 10b5-1 planning).
After our clients agree to a plan for diversification, most of them are surprised at the variety of tools available to them – each serving a slightly different purpose and providing its specific value. Here is a short list of techniques we use:
The first thing we do is help our clients build a “financial team” if they don’t already have one. Good tax accountants and estate attorneys are not easy to find. We provide referrals – and we even have information-sharing with some accountants. This allows us to communicate directly with them and save you time and money.
If you have a team, we are experienced in working with accountants and estate attorneys strategically and administratively. With accountants, it is important that they understand the investment strategies we might use for you to minimize taxes. And we need to understand your tax profile to ensure that the strategies are appropriate and optimized. We often work with estate attorneys when clients are looking to fund trusts or pursue philanthropy, especially with highly-appreciated stock.
We are fiduciaries – we have a legal and ethical responsibility to act in the best interests of our clients.
We are fee-only. We are not compensated for selling or recommending any specific product or service. We do not receive any commissions – we are compensated for creating financial plans (set fee) and for managing portfolios and providing ongoing investment and financial advice (a percentage of Assets Under Management (AUM)).
My planning philosophy is to move quickly in providing value that confirms you made the right decision to hire me. We address your most urgent need or concern first, while we are learning about you. We try to break the planning process into bite-sized chunks that are easy for you to manage. We prioritize topics based on your situation and goals, and we don’t attempt to address everything in our comprehensive planning service right away, unless you make that request. Planning is an ongoing process, and we will always look at the plan and make progress and/or improvements as we go.
Some aspects of a quality financial plan…
Planning done right gives you a complete roadmap to reach success.
The easiest answer to this question is to reference my blog “My 10 Rules of Investing”. Beyond those 10 key concepts, there are some important considerations: