Michael and Sarah own their own business – SD Consultancy (which Sarah established many years ago) and whilst they find work hugely satisfying it is fair to say life was very, very busy for them.
They have 3 children – Emma, William and James with the boys attending a private school some distance away.
Sarah’s workday would often begin with her rising at 5am to complete her daily training schedule (normally a cycle or a run) with each of them keen to be at their workstations by 8.30am.
Michael, having left a successful engineering career to be part of the family business, was intent on freeing up ‘work time’ to have more quality time as a family.
What was clear was their desire to be able to help the kids out financially as they too set out on their own paths in life.
A further factor was that they had committed to extending the house to make it their ‘forever’ home.
Ideally, they each wanted to work fewer hours with a typical workday being from 9am through to 3.30pm with Friday afternoons off. With each both enjoying exercise they would ideally like to be able to do this at a more leisurely time of the day. Being in control of their time was an obvious objective.
Financially, and on the surface, they were in pretty good shape. Sarah, having accumulated substantial assets already – which were largely being managed by a well-known stockbroking firm – and with Mike having built a reasonable pension entitlement via his former employer(s).
In short, they needed a plan which would allow them to:
- Feel more ‘in control’ of their finances
- Make lifestyle decisions around spending more time together as a family
- Feel more secure about their (and by extension their children’s) futures.
What we did for them
First of all, we got Michael and Sarah to think about the kind of lifestyle they wanted for now and into their retirement.
It turned out that each had a passion for travel and especially the type that created family memories and experiences. Using powerful financial planning software, we developed our BettrPlan with them. This helped calculate how much they would need to earn and save over the new few years to be able to retire and be able to live the life of their dreams without the fear of running out of money.
As importantly, Brett Investment was able to establish that they could afford to do the extension and be able to help each of their children out in future years via a gifting strategy.
Finally, once we dug a little bit deeper, we were able to establish that neither Michael nor Sarah was making proper use of all their available tax allowances.
By restructuring how they ‘paid for their lifestyle’ we were able to make significant annual tax savings both whilst building a highly tax-efficient ‘wall of money’ for their and their family’s future. Michael and Sarah are now well on course to achieving their plan. They meet with us annually, so that real progress is made and their dreams can become reality.
