What to expect
Handing someone your taxes and your savings is a real decision, and you shouldn’t have to make it on faith. Here’s how the first call works, who each service fits, and what a year of working together actually looks like.
Let’s talk first. The first call is always free, and whether we go any further is entirely up to you — its only job is to figure out whether this makes sense.
By video or by phone, whenever suits you. If taxes are part of what you need, I may ask you to send last year’s return ahead of time so I can come to the call already up to speed. Otherwise there’s nothing to prepare.
You’re deciding whether you want to work with me. I’m deciding whether I’m the right person for what you need. If I’m not, I’ll tell you on the call.
If you’re married or partnered, I’d like you both there. I work with a household rather than one person’s accounts, and these decisions tend to get made by two people anyway.
I won’t pitch you on the call at all. The time is for understanding your situation and for you to get a sense of me. If I think there’s a fit, I’ll follow up afterward with a proposal you can read on your own time.
Mostly, the first call is you talking. I can’t be useful about your situation until I understand it.
There’s no single profile. But the two services take different kinds of people, and it’s worth being straight about that up front.
Taxes & planning
A W‑2 and a couple of brokerage accounts. A first rental. Equity compensation you don’t fully understand. Self‑employment income, or an entity you set up and aren’t sure you’re using well. A side business and the K‑1s that come with it. A year with something unusual in it.
Straightforward returns and genuinely complicated ones both belong here, along with everything in between. If there’s a reason you want help, that’s reason enough to talk.
Investment management
Managing money takes a certain scale before the fee earns its keep. As a rough guide, this fits households with somewhere between $500,000 and $3 million to invest.
That’s counted across the whole household and every account together — not one account at a time. If you’re close to the line, ask me.
If the investment side isn’t a fit yet, the tax and planning work stands entirely on its own — and for a lot of people it’s the better place to start anyway.
Not a schedule you’re locked into. The rhythm follows how much is actually going on — here’s the shape of it.
Tax work has a natural shape to the year, because the deadlines are fixed and the good decisions come well before them.
Winter into spring
I prepare and file your return, then walk you through it — what happened, and why.
Early summer
We look back at the return together while it’s still fresh. What it told us, what we’d do differently, and what that means for the year already underway.
Later in the year
A check‑in while there’s still time to act — open enrollment choices, charitable giving, and anything worth doing before December 31 rather than after.
How many of these are real meetings depends on you. A straightforward return might need one good conversation a year. A business, equity compensation, or K‑1s usually means more. I’d rather meet when there’s something to decide than fill a calendar.
We always begin by building your financial plan together. After that, the portfolio work doesn’t follow the calendar — it follows markets, and it follows your life, so most of it happens quietly in the background.
At the start
We build your financial plan — where you’re going and what your money has to do to get you there. Everything after this is measured against it.
All year
I’m watching the portfolio, keeping it in balance as things move, and putting new money to work as it arrives.
During the year
We sit down with the plan itself — whether it still describes where you’re going, and whether the portfolio still matches it.
Whenever life changes
A move, a new job, a baby, an inheritance, a business sale. Those are the moments the plan gets revisited, whatever month they land in.
Call or email whenever something comes up — a job offer, an offer on a house, a form you don’t recognize, a decision you want a second opinion on. That’s exactly when I want to hear from you.
Answering questions is part of what you’re paying for, not something billed on top. If one turns out to need real work behind it, I’ll tell you that before I start.
You’ll have a price before you commit to anything. I’d just rather give you that number after I understand your situation than before, because the work isn’t the same for everyone — it depends on how complicated your return is, how much I’m managing, and how much is going on in a given year.
That’s the other thing the first call is for. By the end of it I’ll know enough to quote you a fair number — one that isn’t wrong in either direction.
What I can tell you now is where the money comes from: only you. I’m fee‑only, which means no commissions, no products to sell, and nothing paid to me for pointing you one way instead of another.
Book a time, tell me what’s going on, and I’ll tell you honestly whether I can help — and what it would take. If the answer is no, you’ll get that straight too.
Book a free consultation