Small business owners are at times neglected by the wealth management community as the business is commonly (not always) the owner’s largest asset rather than a portfolio of stocks, bonds, and mutual funds. You’d be well-advised as a business owner to engage a Financial Advisor who is proactive and experienced in factoring your future plans for the business into your overall plan for managing your wealth.
Impactful wealth management for you as a business owner would include at least these elements of exit planning:
Clarifying what “exit” means to you. For example, do you want to leave entirely at some point, or gradually over time?
Clarifying your financial, values-based, legacy goals, and what role the business needs to play in attaining your goals.
A financial needs and gap analysis with an accurate valuation (not back of the envelope - meaningful planning requires accurate data) of the business. How much $$$$ will you need to do everything you want to do after the business? Is there a financial gap? Will that gap need to be closed by increasing the value of the business?
Personal risk management including asset protection, insurance planning, tax planning.
A current estate plan — a business owner cannot do exit planning without doing estate planning.
A plan to preserve the value of the business (typically a small business owner’s largest asset), and a plan for it to survive during unexpected events of your permanent disability or death.
An appropriate plan for managing financial assets resulting from the successful sale or transfer of your business.
Exit planning is wealth management for business owners that requires assessing, preserving, and building the value of your largest and most complex asset…your business.