Financial Advising

A secure financial future is obtained through clearly stated goals and attention to the many components of your financial life. While many of the services outlined below are the building blocks of a plan they must be addressed through an overriding view of what it is you are trying to accomplish.

At the beginning of your relationship with Albion, and constantly throughout the process, Albion works to understand your personal financial and lifetime goals. An understanding of who you are and what you would like to accomplish provides the essential framework for our efforts on your behalf. Our objective is to help you make a series of good financial decisions year after year.

The primary financial goal for many of Albion’s clients is achieving a comfortable retirement. We can help guide you toward financial independence and a secure retirement through planning that includes detailed analysis and forecasts of your pre- and post-retirement life.

Our professional team reviews your current retirement savings strategies, including 401(k), 403(b), IRA, pension, and social security plans and provides advice to help increase your chances of achieving financial independence as you transition into retirement.

Albion discusses the unavoidable tradeoffs inherent in investing and helps you maintain your desired standard of living through careful investment management focused on maximizing after-tax income throughout your retirement years.

Careful estate planning helps you ensure that the assets you have created continue to benefit the people and causes that are most important to you. Without such planning, your estate may be severely diminished by federal and state taxes, with the remainder distributed in ways you might not have chosen.

Albion reviews your current plan with specific attention to the stream of beneficiaries and potential tax consequences. We then recommend strategies consistent with your goals that may transfer more to your heirs while providing financial advantages to you during your lifetime. Albion works with your estate-planning attorney throughout this process.

When planning for an uncertain future many families take great comfort in knowing that the advice and counsel that benefitted them will be available for their children and grandchildren. A part of that is ensuring there is consistent investment management and financial advice for the heirs creating a stabilizing influence across time. When a corporate trustee is required for the optimal execution of an estate plan clients can be assured of continuity by using corporate trustee services available through Albion Financial Group.

A review of financial risks is an important part of the planning process. While certain risks are difficult to mitigate insurance can be a useful tool for offsetting other risks. Albion helps you evaluate your life insurance needs, and compiles a summary of your other policies so the information is readily available in the event of an emergency. We also evaluate various ownership structures for your insurance policies to help you and your family maximize the benefit that such products provide.

As your primary financial advisor, Albion works with you to maintain a comprehensive list of your personal financial information. Such a list may include investment assets, estate planning documents, insurance policies, safe deposit boxes, names of related parties, and instructions for those who may be required to manage your financial affairs if you are unable. Such information is priceless to those who are working to arrange a smooth transition during a difficult time.

In the course of several decades of work Albion has assisted many of our clients though the difficult process of divorce. We offer assistance by considering the different proposed settlement options and providing clarity regarding what our client’s financial life may look like after the divorce. We then work to help our clients post-divorce to use their remaining assets as a foundation to move their life forward in a positive and meaningful way.

With an initial understanding of your goals and objectives Albion turns to an assessment of your current financial situation. This entails an information-gathering exercise that helps you understand your overall financial situation. We clarify your net worth and analyze your cash flows to help you better understand your current situation and plan appropriately for your future. The information from these analyses is viewed from a variety of perspectives. For example, we may determine that your investment allocation should be changed to better match your stated goals. We may also decide that your annual savings rate should be changed or redirected.

Defining the investment objectives and implementing an investment plan is a key component to the long-term financial viability of a philanthropic enterprise. Albion works with several philanthropic organizations helping guide the discussion and implement the agreed upon policy.

We have tremendous respect for our entrepreneurial clients who have created successful small businesses as creating and running a business is a challenging endeavor. Albion provides a sounding board and guidance for our entrepreneurial clients with a specific focus on the steps a business owner should take to “clean up” a business for eventual transfer to new ownership whether via gifting, internal or third party sale, or public offering.

Albion helps clients sort through many of the decisions involved in buying, managing and selling real estate assets. Our primary focus is on how real estate fits the client’s overall financial situation and offer clarity regarding the risk created from the debt typically associated with real estate ownership. Our expertise ranges from financing strategies to exploring terms of a purchase or sale.

Albion provides guidance in establishing and investing in IRAs, 401(k)s, pensions, and retirement plans. We work directly with you and offer advice on how you should allocate dollars to retirement plans. We never lose sight of helping each client find the best plan for them.

All too often, planning a financial future for children and grandchildren is limited to estate planning. While the estate planning process is excellent at moving assets between generations in a tax efficient manner, it does little or nothing toward passing on the values and insights that are your true legacy. Albion is skilled in consulting with clients and beneficiaries on ways to pass the values as well as the monetary wealth, increasing the likelihood that future generations will truly benefit from your legacy.

Your income and investment structure is analyzed with an eye toward uncovering any tax efficiencies that may enhance your financial situation. This may be simple, such as shifting from taxable to tax-exempt money market funds. A more complex recommendation might involve prepaying certain tax preference items to minimize the impact of the Alternative Minimum Tax or converting a portion of retirement assets to Roth IRAs. In tax related issues Albion works with your accountant to develop a balanced plan that is most suitable for you.

The financial issues of a not-for profit entity are significantly different than those facing for profit enterprises. The professionals at Albion are familiar with these differences and work with not-for profits to help them succeed in their chosen mission. Several Albion employees serve on non-profit boards throughout the Salt Lake valley ranging from Primary and Secondary Education institutions to Medical entities. Albion members have served various roles from contributing Board member to higher fiduciary responsibilities including Treasurer. The amount of cumulative years of Board of Trustee experience allows us to offer expertise in many non-profit areas.

Once they have sufficient wealth to ensure their own financial stability, many people take great pleasure in supporting charitable causes. Albion’s team has the knowledge and experience to address how charitable giving impacts both your charitable and non-charitable goals. We can guide you through the broad spectrum of philanthropic strategies in an effort to find the most appropriate tools for your situation. Such guidance includes how charitable giving may impact your current and future cash flows, your current and future income taxes, your favored charitable causes, and the estate to be passed on to your heirs.

In addition to our professional investment management and financial advisory offerings we provide family office services for a select group of clients. Our family office team handles a variety of routine and specialty household tasks such as bill paying assistance, notary services, and U.S. mail management allowing you more flexibility and personal freedom. We also serve as a liaison between you and your affiliated advisors to help manage the complexity of your multifaceted personal financial situation.

Our family office efforts result in you having greater clarity about where you stand and the peace of mind that comes with knowing many of your personal financial issues are being taken care of in a timely and professional manner.

Many parents and grandparents, aware of the rapid escalation of costs for both secondary and higher education, wish to take the appropriate steps to meet education funding needs within their family. We help you estimate future education expenses, determine reasonable rate of return assumptions, and explore various education funding alternatives including trusts, Education Savings Accounts, 529 plans, and Uniform Transfers to Minors Act accounts. Albion analyzes education funding options in the context of your overall financial picture to assess its impact on your long-term financial plan.