From Fighter Pilot to Flat-Fee Advisor with Steve Ankerstar | Financial Planner Search

Financial Planner Search · Jul 21, 2026 · 25m

In this episode of Financial Planner Search, Steve Ankerstar, founder of Ankerstar Wealth and a retired Air Force fighter pilot, discusses how "getting angry" at the finance industry led him to build a flat-fee, fiduciary firm for the mass affluent. Frustrated by the "we're smart, you're dumb, just hand us your money" mentality and by mutual funds that quietly overexposed him to a single stock while charging nearly 1%, Steve set out to do it better. Today his eight-person team (six of whom are former military or teachers) serves over 300 clients with a service-first, "we're just like your…