FAQs

·       Managing concentrated assets: As a long time tech worker, Paul knows firsthand the challenges of compensation in the form of company equity. He can provide insight into tax planning methods to mitigate risk and diversify among other asset classes.

·       Tax strategy: Some firms focus only on reducing taxes here and now – without thinking of the future tax bill. If it’s better for you to pay taxes now on some element of your plan, we’ll be upfront and open with you.

·       Implementation: We’ll be with you throughout the execution of your plan. We don’t just provide you a set of recommendations and expect you to do the heavy lifting of making it happen. In some areas (like insurance planning), we may be able to do the implementation for you. In other areas (like tax preparation or estate planning), we are available to meet with your team of experts to ensure your plan is implemented as intended.

Our clients generally share one or more of the following attributes:

1.      Concentrated assets: A large portion of these clients’ net worth is held in employer stock or real estate or a privately held business. They need advice mitigating their risk or turning these assets into income or transitioning to the next generation.

2.      High marginal tax rate: Clients who routinely make a high income, or who have recently moved into a higher income tax bracket and need help managing the exposure to taxes.

3.      Pre-retirees: Clients who are within 5-10 years of retirement and need help managing their assets to avoid a poorly timed market downturn from disrupting their retirement plans.

4.      Retirees: Clients have retired and are actively deriving income from their assets.

5.      Young or mid-career high income earners: These clients may not have large investable assets, but need advice on how to strategically develop assets in a tax aware manner to support long term goals.

Schreier Wealth has aligned with LPL Financial, the largest independent broker/dealer in the nation. Paul Schreier is a Wealth Management Advisor for LPL Financial. LPL serves as the custodian for investments.

Yes. As a registered representative, we are regulated by FINRA and as an Investment Advisor Representative (IAR) affiliated with a Registered Investment Advisor (RIA) we are regulated by the SEC.

Yes, Paul Schreier is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNERTM and is held to a fiduciary standard of care in all of his planning recommendations with advisory clients.

Fee-based Planning engagements

In almost all situations, Schreier Wealth engages with clients in a fee-based engagement. We aim to be completely transparent with our fees and the value clients receive.

These engagements can take the form of either a fee charged as a percentage of assets under management, a pure fee payment based on a scope of work, or some combination of both.

We strive to be flexible with these arrangements because we strongly believe everyone can benefit from the skilled, professional advice of a planning professional. However, the widely used percentage of assets under management (AUM) model doesn’t fit everyone: Perhaps your assets are primarily composed of direct real estate holdings, private business holdings, or a workplace retirement plan. Or maybe you just like executing trades yourself or picking your own individual underlying investments. In all of these cases, Schreier Wealth is still able to offer comprehensive advice on asset allocation, estate planning strategy, tax strategy, risk management considerations, and many other areas in a fee-based arrangement, usually on an annual basis.

Most of our clients do eventually end up with a fee-based planning engagement based on the percentage of assets under management with Schreier Wealth, however. Ultimately, clients need their assets to generate income, with decreasing levels of risk, as they age.  This necessity requires investments in asset classes outside of whatever the core holdings might have been present earlier in life (real estate, privately held business equity, etc.). However, it is not required that clients migrate to this model.

Transaction-compensated business

At Schreier Wealth, we are not exclusively a fee-based planning organization. We do believe that certain commission-compensated services are appropriate to provide to our clients as a service to ensure different elements of a financial plan are actually executed, and done so in accordance with the larger plan. These might include placing different insurance policies, such as life, disability, or long term care insurance, or implementing inherently brokerage based financial vehicles, such as 529 plan accounts. In all cases that we are compensated by commission, we will make the client aware of this potential conflict of interest. And even when we are providing education or advice on fee-based products, we are held to a fiduciary standard of care with advisory clients, meaning every recommendation is in the client’s best interest.

Absolutely – in fact, we see best results when our team gets to know your team. We routinely join discussions with our clients’ tax advisers, attorneys, book keepers, bankers or other professionals.

Generally, there is no investment minimum to work with Schreier Wealth. However, there are fees associated with our advice, whether they are paid directly or charged as a percentage of assets invested. We will be completely transparent with you on the costs associated with working with our firm.

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