Latest / Financial Planner Search / Exit Planning & Financial Autonomy for Entrepreneurs with Chris Clepp | Financial Planner Search
Transcript
- Gregory Wilnau: Chris, thank you so much for being here today and joining the podcast. It's great to see you. Chris Clepp: Great to be here. It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood, right? Gregory Wilnau: Yeah, right, man, that's right. So why don't we open up with just maybe tell us a little bit about your practice and kind of what you specialize in. Chris Clepp: Yeah, so I run a wealth management practice that focuses on Gen X and Gen Y business owners, dealing with founders, entrepreneurs, ⁓ people like me running around with their hair on fire, moving just a million miles an hour. ⁓ People there just really looking to decrease their mental load so they can focus on the highest and best use of their time, right? ⁓ I know for me, I want to be the best parent, the best spouse. ⁓ the best business owner I can be. And that's what I'm trying to help all of my clients to be able to do. Gregory Wilnau: I love that. I typically follow up with this question with maybe you could tell us a little bit more about maybe what inspired you to do this. It sounds like you also have personal experience ⁓ in this as well. Like maybe you might be your ideal client. But help me me understand a little bit more about what inspired you to to do this. Chris Clepp: Yeah, so I didn't really start out trying to be a financial planner. I started in the insurance business now almost 25 years ago. But my first day in the business was September 11, the 9-11. And I was going in on my first day, or planning on going in on my first day, and the world changed around me. Quite honestly, I was going in thinking it was just another sales job. And I found out was turning. I was getting into a business that was just about helping people protect what it is that they truly love. And that was meaningful to me. it began changing my viewpoint on what I could accomplish in this world. And so it turns out I have a natural ability to have conversations and I was able to connect with people on meaningful levels and help them realize what it is and how they should protect their loved ones and what they've amassed in. in this world. And so in the insurance world, what happens is that you quickly get promoted into management. And before long, I went out and started a business with a few other partners. And we ended up having a brokerage that had offices in four cities. So again, I wasn't planning on being a business owner. And like most business owners, I just sort of fell into it. My path happened to be along the sales route, right? So we did very well. We grew this nicely. The great financial crisis hit and our business model was built largely on the fact that we are helping people protect and pay off the mortgage in the event of their death. A lot of our leads came through the mortgage industry. had partnerships with mortgage companies. So you can imagine how well that business did there in 2007 and 2008. And so I didn't plan well for myself at that time. I didn't plan for the what ifs. you know, and so When I talk to business owners, I do truly understand what can go wrong because I've lived it. And so I went back into the insurance industry in a different role, built up again. But what I realized was that being a good insurance agent leaves you wanting in the relationships with your clients. That you can be the best insurance agent in the world and you're still viewed largely transactionally. And if you want to really get that... Gregory Wilnau: Yeah. Yeah. Chris Clepp: personal connection with them, need to start getting digging deeper. And that's when you start picking up the investments. And then when you realize that just the investments doesn't make you a real connection, that you really need to get into real financial planning, that's where we've gotten to now with building towards wealth is trying to have that deep, meaningful connection with like-minded individuals and help them realize the goals that they've worked so hard for throughout their lives. Gregory Wilnau: I love it. So it was ultimately wanting to offer better service and more personalized, deeper connection with the people that you work with that kind of inspired you to do this. Chris Clepp: Yeah, just like a lot of my clients, always trying to get a little bit better each and every year. And a big part of that is having more meaningful connections with my clients. Gregory Wilnau: That's great. How many clients do you have now? Chris Clepp: So we currently serve a little over 50 households ⁓ on our way to hopefully getting to 100 over the next few years before we have to figure out what the next step is for us from a growth perspective. Gregory Wilnau: 50 plus households, that's awesome. Congratulations, Chris. Okay, let's talk a little bit more about the people that you serve. Maybe you could take a second to describe the type of person who comes to you. What's a typical situation that they might come to you with or that you would lead them through? Chris Clepp: Mm-hmm. Yeah, so the most common, right, is that they're thinking about exiting or already in the exit process and they're about to realize a large liquidity event or they know that it's coming in a short period of time. Now, what I wish is that they would have contacted me much earlier because we can create so much more value for them a year, two years, five years ahead of that liquidity event. But that often is a big catalyst is that they realize that they're going to have a larger amount of money and then they then realize that they're also going to have probably a large tax bill. Unfortunately, we can only do so much when it's a short time window. But if it's not that, they may have had a friend sold of business and then suddenly, obviously, an exit feels real for them because a close friend or family member has gone through it. It's no longer really hypothetical. They can envision themselves having some sort of accident. They may have had a change in personal status, right? Maybe another kid, they start thinking more seriously about the future. Or oftentimes also as the company got past that, am I going to make it phase, right? They weren't sure for a couple of years whether they were going to make it. And now they get that foundation laid more fully and now it's time for them to think more holistically. So those are the big, big movers for our clients when they come to us. Gregory Wilnau: time. Yeah, well, know, when you're just trying to make it, oftentimes this isn't something you're not thinking about anything else, you know? So I was going to ask you, what do you think some of the reasons are that somebody might do this last minute? And then I think kind of answered your own question. But don't let me speak for you. What are some of the reasons you think oftentimes people put this sort of thing off last minute? Have you noticed any patterns? Chris Clepp: Yeah, I think there's a few reasons, right? One is that a lot of financial planning just doesn't resonate with the business owner. Business owners are very comfortable with concentration risk, and maybe they had an advisor that was trying to get them to ⁓ diversify too much too quickly. ⁓ They always figured that the business would be their entire retirement plan. ⁓ Unfortunately, a lot of times that's just sort of hope they don't actually know what the value is going to be or what actually even is enough to get them towards retirement. But a lot of this thinking about things that is outside of their business as their driver, their financial engine sort of has put it off, not realizing that there's so much more to real financial planning. When you talk about the tax planning and the estate planning, ⁓ the exit planning, there's a lot of other value that can be brought into it that Gregory Wilnau: Mm. Chris Clepp: they oftentimes don't understand is part of the real financial planning. And that's why they've put it off. Gregory Wilnau: All right, that makes sense. Let's talk more about maybe the first time that you're, let's talk more about when your clients come to you, right? So they've had these realizations, they have an event that's happened, coming up. So they anticipate this and all of a sudden it's thrust into their awareness. What are some of the questions that they'll typically ask you or bring to you when they meet with you for the first time? Help us understand more about where their head's at. Chris Clepp: me Yeah. So if they're already thinking about that exit, right, they're thinking, how can I keep the most from the sale of my business? How can I use that money that I'm going to have? Because up until this point, day after day, year after year for 10, 20, 30 years, they've been doing the same thing over and over. And now they're going to have, they need some additional direction on what to do with their capital that they didn't previously have to think about. A lot of business owners, when they come to me, if they're earlier in the process, they're thinking about when can I sell my business or when should I sell my business? We get a question a lot of times from our business owners. They may get a cold approach and they're trying to figure out whether or not the offer that they have on the table is enough. The other thing that every business owner has a... Gregory Wilnau: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Chris Clepp: Interesting relationship with taxes and so a lot of them are trying to figure out how can I stop paying so much in taxes every year? So maybe that business finally got past that am I gonna make a point now they're starting to make money and then they walked into walked into their tax preparers offices here and found out the tax bill was Much bigger than them than what they thought it would be and so these are some of the questions that Yeah, I mean listen Gregory Wilnau: That's never a good feeling. That's never a good feeling. Chris Clepp: I know as a business owner that trying to figure out that tax bill and trying to keep it to ⁓ only the pennies I actually owe and none of the pennies I shouldn't be paying is always a challenge for us. ⁓ And so those are the right questions that they should be asking and we want to be able to help them with those numbers. They want to be able to know that they're going to be able to keep what they're earning and then they also want to be able to know when they can walk away from what they're doing. And a lot of times when they walk in, they just are not very clear on what that end goal looks like for them. They feel sometimes a little trapped in their business that there's no next chapter for them. And we want to make sure that we can plan around that and let them know that all this effort that they're putting into their business is going to elicit the results they want on the backside. Gregory Wilnau: Mm-hmm. Yeah. It sounds like one of the things that you also help with is when you know, you're, know what it's like to do own a business and being a business, you have your head down, working hard so much. And you can often forget to look up. And it sounds like that's one of the things that you help your clients with that they appreciate is looking up for a minute and getting clear of the bigger picture and what to build into next and how to make that transition. Would you say that's fair? Chris Clepp: Yeah, I mean, listen, they have oftentimes, you know, they are head down, right? They have too many moving pieces. ⁓ You know, there is no coordinated strategy for them, you know, because the accountant is doing something different than what the attorney wants, which is different than what the banker recommends. know, nobody's quarterbacking the larger financial picture for them. And they find out they have tax blind spots everywhere. ⁓ You know, there's just too many moving pieces in their both their business and their personal financial lives to be able to have a holistic view of it all. so oftentimes what gets sacrificed is the personal financial piece, because they're so focused just on the next step in front of them in trying to run a profitable business. Gregory Wilnau: Yeah. Well, to every business owner out there who's listening, you can only do so much at one time. So don't let Gil get in the way of taking the next step. There's a time and a place for everything. All right. Let's talk a little bit more about your values and your approach. Kind of how what it looks like for a business owner to work with you. To start, help me understand where you typically find your clients. So where do you typically find your clients and what are some of the ways that you get to know them as individuals? Chris Clepp: Yeah, great question. So a lot of my clients come from referrals of other clients, which I think is the, is the best way. it speaks that the, the clients I am working with see value in what I'm doing. ⁓ I also get referrals from, ⁓ from some accountants, ⁓ some attorneys along the way. And what we're really trying to help our clients understand, right? You know, when we talk with our clients, ⁓ what's a little bit different is that we. really don't talk a lot of retirement with what we do. We talk a lot of autonomy with what we do, right? Cause if you're like me, you know, I can't sit still even if you paid me to, right? I always have to be doing something. And if I wasn't, if I wasn't running a wealth management practice, I'd be doing something else. And quite honestly, most of my clients are just like that. They don't want to retire. They just want to be able to know that they could stop working in their business either by, because they get Gregory Wilnau: Mm-hmm. Chris Clepp: walk in one day and decide that they're tired and want to move on doing something else, or it could be a change for family reasons, right? It could be that, you know, if you had a spouse or a kid that needed more of your attention for medical reasons or whatever it is, you want to be able to know that you have the autonomy to make the decisions where money isn't the only driver you're driving for contentment, right? Gregory Wilnau: Yeah. Chris Clepp: And because we always want to make sure that that money has a proper place in our clients lives, which is a wonderful servant, not a horrible master. Gregory Wilnau: Yeah. So it's more about like using the business to create autonomy, to create options, to feel like the business serves you instead of you constantly serving the business. Flexibility, these sorts of things. That's great. I love that. How about some of the ways you get to know them as individuals? Would you feel like you kind of already answered that question? I think you might have already answered that question. Chris Clepp: Well, I think that a big part of it is trying to understand what their values and their vision truly is. ⁓ Most business owners ⁓ are not just trying, at least my clients are not just trying to get more. It's not, they don't want to do the Scrooge McDuck backstroke through a pile of money. That's not the point of this. What they want to be able to do is to be able to have the time with their spouse, be able to have that next chapter in charitable ⁓ interests. Some of clients just wanna be able to end up going and doing more golfing, right? But we wanna make sure that we understand what their vision of true success and what's gonna actually make them content is. Like for someone like me, it's about being able to drop off my kids to school, being able to pick them up from school, being able to be the coach of the baseball and the basketball team. Those are the things that are important for me. And so I want... to make sure that my business and money drives the ability to do that. And at the end of the day, I want my client to be able to feel as comfortable just hanging out with me ⁓ on a porch, a beer or non-alcoholic beverage as it is these days, as they would be just talking about finances. And I think to be able to really make the as true impactful financial planning change, we do need to be able to connect on a human level. as well. our intake, you when we're talking with them, we want to make sure that we understand their money mindset, their relationship with that and what's driving them as humans, not just as dollars and cents. Gregory Wilnau: Yeah, there's no better way to get to know somebody than drinking a beer on a porch together. Or non-alcoholic beverage, as you said. All right, so let's, I feel like we've got a pretty good handle on your clients, what they come to you with, what some of their problems are, how you get to know them, how you help them work through things. ⁓ Help us understand more about where you're thinking about the future in your business. So when it comes to your practice, Chris Clepp: Mm-hmm or non-alcoholic beverage these days Gregory Wilnau: ⁓ Where do you see it in the next one to three years? What's your vision? Are there any goals that you're working on? Chris Clepp: Yeah, it's a great question, right? ⁓ building towards wealth continues to grow. Right now it's me and associate advisor, my assistant. And so I do have a 29 year old daughter who works at Fidelity. ⁓ And so I hope that in a couple of years, once they finish paying for all of her education and training, that she will come work with me as the next generation of the firm, right? ⁓ Like my clients, don't want to ever stop doing what I'm doing. ⁓ And so we will continue to grow. And so the plan is for probably in 2029, knock on wood is that my daughter will be able to come work for me and that ⁓ we'll work together for a few years. And then we'll figure out what sort of practice she wants. Maybe she wants the same type of business that dad has had, which prioritizes ⁓ time over Gregory Wilnau: Mm-hmm. Chris Clepp: ⁓ you know, over every last penny, but it may be different. There may be a different path for her as, as we grow. we'll, we'll see how that goes, but we'll continue to grow, continue to look to have, you know, real meaningful relationships, try and find the right fits for us. ⁓ cause it's a part of making sure that, that we only work with the clients that we feel that we can have the highest and, know, and best use for if clients are just looking for a stock picker, ⁓ that's not. Gregory Wilnau: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Chris Clepp: what we're doing, right? If they're looking for the cool trades, if they're looking for people to be super reactive to the markets and deal with that, what we want to do is we want to build the type of practice with clients that are abundance-minded, ⁓ optimistic facing, that want to build with a financial partner that is going to help them be proactive in what they do. ⁓ Gregory Wilnau: Yeah, be strategic and intentional. Yeah, I'd imagine too with business owners. mean, I know this is ⁓ succession, right? Thinking about the future and what happens next. So it's cool that you are also intending to grow your business into the point where you bring on your daughter and succeed. She succeeds you. So you're kind of eating your own dog food, so to speak, right? So I love that. Chris Clepp: It's funny that that that exact statement came up earlier today, right? You know, I'm building general generationally. I'm already thinking about, you know, the end in mind. I'm thinking of. Secession for me, right? You know, it's not theory, you know, because I think about the same things as my clients, right? Like how can remove single points of failure? Something I've dealt with in my earlier life with with my business building structure around finances, you know. optimizing the dollars that do come in, what goes back to the business, what goes back to future goals, what supports my lifestyle. I'm helping myself coordinate with my CPAs and my attorneys. I'm preparing for the next chapter, what that looks like for the business and making sure that I'm focused on the highest and best use of my time. These are all things that we help with my clients, but things I think of internally myself. Gregory Wilnau: Yeah, I love it. love it. All right. Well, ⁓ the next question I like to ask here is like you to maybe take a second to brag about yourself. think oftentimes, you know, we focus a lot on what we could do better. And it's challenging or we have to be more intentional about acknowledging the things that we do well. So maybe you could put your humble hat on for a second and think about something that you do for your clients that might take a lot of time or energy, but that they might never see or know about. Is there anything that stands out to you? Chris Clepp: Yeah, I mean, I think that. ⁓ What clients don't see is the amount of work and effort that we try to do proactively in between the meetings that we have, right? So we have a couple of bigger meetings that we have during the year that are really financial planning focused that we're trying to keep the clients on the bigger picture. ⁓ And we're trying to execute a lot of things during the year. We're communicating with their attorney when needed. We're communicating with ⁓ their CPAs and their tax professionals. a couple of times a year to make sure that we're maximizing for that. We are reviewing, while we are not a very active trader in the markets, we are keeping an eye on their accounts for them. And that we do have a regular cadence that's built in behind the scenes so that our clients never have to think about these things. Because again, we want them focused on the big values that they can create in their lives. Again, being a good parent, good spouse, good business owner, and not having to think about all the small repetitive tests that we've built out because while they have one shot at it, we're doing it 50 odd times a year for our clients and ideally creating a lot of efficiency in being able to do that. Gregory Wilnau: So speaking of cadence, maybe you could take a moment to walk us through your actual process. So when somebody becomes a client, let's say somebody becomes a client today, maybe you could walk us through kind of what happens the first four to eight weeks. What does it look like to work with you during the first four to eight weeks and then maybe the course of a calendar year? Chris Clepp: Hmm? Mm-hmm. Yeah. So, I mean, listen, most clients walk in expecting to hand over financial statements and start talking numbers right away. Right. That's not, that's not what happens with us. Well, I said, you know, the first meeting is about understanding them, ⁓ you know, helping them be able to have a true vision and, and a defined set of values that they are going to execute that vision on. ⁓ and, and they haven't begun like, and so, you know, I'm a big Stephen Covey guy, you know, begin with the end in mind. ⁓ These clients a lot of times go in not knowing what they don't know. They're unclear about the relationship with their money that they have. ⁓ Business owners often are very good at giving themselves jobs without having any enterprise value. And so we want to make sure that we get them clear on where it is that we're going, because that at least gives us a direction that we can get them moving. Because we can't figure out what we're supposed to do for them if we don't understand why they're doing it. Right. ⁓ and so once we understand what they're really doing it for, ⁓ and we help them envision what it is that they want both from a long-term perspective, ⁓ and then what's important for them in the short and medium term. Right. And that's where we, what we want to do initially, because once we get them clear on their vision and their values and their mindset about things, then we can start begin, then we can start taking in. the documents and seeing what they have and begin educating them about different steps that they could take to be more efficient in their financial lives. And then we can begin shaping that and begin making some implementation in the plan. So I will tell you, the ⁓ first couple of months are going to be, you depending on the complexity and their bandwidth and a few different factors, like it's going to be three to five meetings in those first 60 to 90 days, depending on the client's schedule. ⁓ And then once we get through that and work through the modules we have and help them understand cashflow and risk management and tax planning and estate planning, then we're going to move into our ongoing relationship, which is meeting ⁓ schedule meetings a couple of times a year that are trying to be big picture, because we're going to send them their portfolio review and their insurance review and their tax review separately outside of those meetings, because that's the what. And if they have questions, obviously they can always reach out to me, because really at the end of the day, we're helping our clients just make a bunch of smart financial decisions. And as I tell them, if it If it costs them a dollar or makes them a dollar, I want them to feel free to call me and ask me because either I have the answer, I can get the answer, or I can introduce them to someone who can give the answer to them. Right. And so we just want to be that, that almost that easy button for our clients in helping them deal with all these financial issues that they have coming down the pipeline for. Right. ⁓ you know, and cause a lot of times when, when you go through this, ⁓ you know, people are doing things. but they're mistaking activity for productivity. They're going a million miles an hour. They're making progress. But the question is, is the progress even in the right direction? And so we want to get them first clear on that direction. And then we can begin executing and optimizing for them moving forward. Gregory Wilnau: Mm-hmm. Right, right. Yeah, I love that. So it sounds like you really front load a lot of the stuff to better understand the situation. And then once you kind of execute on some of these things, you check in and meet in regularly to keep the big picture in mind. And that kind of always is in flux. But you just like to check in, help your clients out. I bet they really enjoy having the ability to take a lot of this stuff off their shoulders because you kind of take it on for them. So ⁓ I think that's great. All right, so for anybody who's interested in possibly working with you, ⁓ how should they get in touch with you? What should they do next? Chris Clepp: Yeah, that's great. They can go to our website, is buildingtowardswealth.com. That's buildingtowardswealth.com and click the start here button. They can learn about me. They can learn about our process and who exactly it is that we do our best work. Gregory Wilnau: All right, Chris, really appreciate the interview. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast, sharing with us more about what you do and your clients and how you serve them. Appreciate you coming on, buddy. Chris Clepp: Thank you.