Financial Advisors

Strategic Financial Advisors for Life’s Most Important Decisions
At EP Wealth, we offer personalized financial strategies to help manage your wealth across every stage of life, including investment management, tax planning, estate considerations, and major life transitions. Our financial advisors bring the experience and structure needed to guide complex financial lives with clarity and purpose.

What Does a Financial Advisor Do?

A financial advisor helps you evaluate your complete financial picture and develop strategies to support your unique goals, whether that involves portfolio balancing, managing risk and tax exposure, preparing for retirement, or planning for future generations. At EP Wealth, this often includes coordinating with your legal and tax professionals to bring multiple aspects of your financial life into alignment.

We assist clients through a range of complex situations, such as:

Business sales, stock option events, or liquidity planning
Retirement transitions and income distribution
Inheritance, estate matters, or philanthropic giving
Divorce, remarriage, or planning across blended families

Our clients include executives, physicians, attorneys, entrepreneurs, business owners, professional athletes, and professionals in the tech and entertainment industries. Each relationship begins with a structured, personalized plan that reflects your goals and the responsibilities that come with significant financial decision-making.

EP Wealth’s Personalized Approach to Financial Planning

We begin every relationship with a financial health assessment and a deep dive into your current financial structure, priorities, and concerns. This includes evaluating your income, liabilities, real estate holdings, investment accounts, business interests, and future goals.

Following this discovery phase, we provide financial planning services that include:

Proposals for asset allocation and investment strategy
Risk and cash flow analysis
Tax planning strategies
Estate and charitable giving considerations

Regular reviews allow us to adapt your plan in response to market shifts, changes in your life, or updates to tax laws. The goal is to help keep your plan aligned with your evolving circumstances.

Why Should HNWIs Work with a Financial Advisor?

Managing substantial wealth often brings added complexity for high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs). That complexity can stem from concentrated stock holdings, private investments, real estate portfolios, or the desire to support future generations.

An experienced financial advisor can help:

Coordinate strategies that address taxes, legacy planning, and charitable giving
Guide planning for liquidity events, such as IPOs or business transitions
Evaluate risk across asset classes and income sources
Provide structure and support for intergenerational planning

By working with EP Wealth, you gain access to a team that understands how to approach these considerations with precision and care.

The Full Scope of Our Financial Advisory Services

We offer comprehensive services designed to address both near-term financial priorities and broader objectives:

Retirement Planning: Develop income strategies to support your desired lifestyle throughout retirement.
Estate Planning: Work with your legal team to help align your estate plan with your legacy goals.
Tax Planning: Explore strategies such as tax-loss harvesting and tax bracket management.
Business Planning: Support business owners with succession strategies, liquidity events, and real estate considerations.
Investment Management: Provide portfolio recommendations aligned with your risk tolerance and long-term objectives.
Charitable Planning: Assist with structuring donations and charitable vehicles that reflect your philanthropic goals.
Divorce Planning: Help manage financial transitions and asset division with care and objectivity.
Wealth Management for Professional and College Athletes: Address unique financial considerations related to contracts, endorsements, and short earnings windows.

How to Choose a Financial Advisor

When selecting a financial advisor, consider the following:

Is the advisor held to a fiduciary standard?
Does the advisor have experience with clients who have complex financial needs?
Are the firm’s services integrated across investments, taxes, and estate considerations?
Is the fee structure transparent and aligned with your interests?

EP Wealth advisors act in your best interest and are supported by a multidisciplinary team. We focus on helping clients take meaningful steps toward managing and preserving their wealth.

Case Study: Planning Around a Liquidity Event and Legacy Goals

The following is a hypothetical scenario based on real experiences we've had working with clients.

Background: A couple in their early 60s sold their family-owned business for $22 million. They wanted to support their children, contribute to charitable causes, and transition into retirement without unnecessary tax exposure.

Complication: They had no financial plan in place prior to the sale, resulting in limited options for reducing capital gains taxes. Without coordination between their financial, tax, and legal advisors, critical planning windows were missed.

Outcome: The couple quickly moved $12 million of the sale proceeds into a taxable brokerage account, relying on past investment habits instead of a coordinated strategy. This triggered capital gains that could have been reduced with pre-sale planning. The couple began taking withdrawals from their traditional IRA first, pushing their taxable income into a higher bracket and reducing eligibility for Medicare premium thresholds. They gifted $3 million to their adult children outright, which triggered a significant gift tax filing. No charitable vehicles were established, despite their stated interest in philanthropy.

How an EP Wealth Financial Advisor Could Have Helped:
An EP Wealth advisor could have worked with the couple ahead of the sale to:

Recommend charitable strategies or donor-advised funds to reduce capital gains exposure
Establish trusts to support family gifting goals while providing asset protection and tax efficiency
Model retirement income scenarios to guide tax-aware withdrawal decisions
Collaborate with their CPA and estate attorney to coordinate the transaction across legal, tax, and financial planning considerations

Conclusion: Planning ahead with a financial advisor can help you navigate large financial events with more clarity and coordination, while better supporting your goals for your family and future.

Frequently Asked Questions

What services do high-net-worth financial advisors provide?
They provide support in areas like investment oversight, tax planning, estate coordination, business and charitable planning, and multi-generational wealth transfer.

What qualifications should be sought in a financial advisor?
Look for advisors who are fiduciaries, have experience with complex financial situations, and hold designations such as CFP^®. Depth of services and team resources are also important.

How are financial advisors compensated?
At EP Wealth, we operate on a transparent, fee-based model. We do not receive commissions from selling financial products.

Is my information kept confidential when working with a financial advisor?
Yes. We maintain strict confidentiality protocols and secure data practices to protect client information.

When should I consider hiring a financial advisor?
A financial advisor can be helpful during major life transitions, such as selling a business, preparing for retirement, receiving an inheritance, navigating divorce, or planning a legacy for future generations.

Find a Financial Advisor Who’s Ready to Serve Your Needs

EP Wealth is proud to serve clients across the country through offices in Arizona, California, Colorado, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, Washington, and beyond. Connect with a financial advisor near you.

Whether you’re preparing for retirement, managing a liquidity event, or planning your legacy, we’re here to help you navigate what’s next.

DISCLOSURES

The information presented here is not intended to be regarded as a comprehensive list of considerations, including but not limited to, categories, services, or qualifications that a client or prospective client should consider when assessing or comparing Financial Advisors and/or Firms. As the author of this piece, EP Wealth Advisors, LLC (“EPWA”) has tailored the messaging of this article to align with the categories, services, qualifications, capabilities and services that it offers. EPWA makes no representations or warranties as to the accuracy, timeliness, suitability, completeness, or relevance of any information presented. EPWA reserves the right to make changes to some or all of the information displayed here without notice.
The need for a financial advisor or financial planner and/or the type of services required are specific to the uniqueness of each individual’s circumstances. The content and topics expressed here are limited in nature and intentionally written to highlight the services offered by EPWA. There is no guarantee or warrantee that the services offered by EPWA will satisfy your financial services requirements. Services offered by other advisors may be more suitable to your specific needs.
Request an appointment with an EP Wealth Advisor when you have a minimum of $500,000 in investable assets – which includes qualified retirement plans (IRA, Roth IRA, 401(k), taxable brokerage, cash (savings / checking) and CDs. Investable assets do not include your home, vehicles, or collectibles.
EPWA offers services to a variety of clients, including but not limited to the clients referenced herein. Although, a client type has been identified here, EPWA cannot guarantee that it has extensive experience working with the type of clients named. Experience working with different clients differs and EPWA cannot guarantee nor imply that it has expertise serving all client types.
There is no guarantee that the services detailed herein will be offered and/or delivered to a client or prospective client. The services EPWA offers clients will depend on a number of factors including the need of each respective client for the service and the willingness of the client to provide all supporting and/or required information that will allow EPWA the opportunity to deliver a service. In many instances, clients or prospective clients may not have a need for all or some of the services detailed here, and, therefore, will not receive that service.
Hiring a qualified advisor and/or financial planner does not guarantee investment success and does not ensure that a client or prospective client will experience a higher level of performance or results. No guaranty or warranty is made that any direct or implied results or projections being represented here will be met or sustained.
Information presented is general in nature and should not be viewed as a comprehensive analysis of the topics discussed. It is intended to serve as a tool containing general information that should assist you in the development of subsequent discussions. Content does not involve the rendering of personalized investment advice nor is it intended to supplement professional individualized advice.
All investment strategies have the potential for profit or loss. Different types of investments and investment strategies involve varying degrees of risk, and there can be no assurance that any specific investment or strategy will be suitable or profitable for a client's portfolio. The risk of loss can never be eliminated even if working with a professional.
EP Wealth Advisors, LLC. is registered as an investment advisor with the SEC and only transacts business in states where it is properly registered or is excluded or exempted from registration requirements. SEC registration does not constitute an endorsement of the firm by the Commission nor does it indicate that the advisor has attained a particular level of skill or ability.
The information presented is hypothetical in nature and not reflective of a real client or scenario. There is no guarantee nor is the intention of this example to establish any sense of assurance, that, if followed, the strategies referenced here will produce a positive or desired outcome. In fact, there is no guarantee or warranty that any of the steps detailed will enable a positive outcome, successful or desired results. The intent of this hypothetical example is strictly for educational and illustrative purposes only.

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